


We Could Be a Little Something

by WinterRose527



Category: Game of Thrones (TV)
Genre: Emotional Hurt/Comfort, F/M, Fluff and Angst, Friends to Lovers, I'm sure it will be too fluffy for people who are looking for that, Past Relationship(s), Past Robb Stark/Jeyne Westerling, Single Parents, Widowed, past Trystane Martell/Myrcella Baratheon, there will definitely be moments, though admittedly
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2021-01-07
Updated: 2021-02-24
Packaged: 2021-03-17 18:20:17
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 26
Words: 165,948
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/28604346
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/WinterRose527/pseuds/WinterRose527
Summary: Robb and Myrcella had true, life-changing love - with other people. But their spouses passed away and they've been raising their sons on their own.When their sons are in the same kindergarten class, and become quick friends, Robb and Myrcella develop a friendship too.The title comes from the 'title ask' thing I did a while back.
Relationships: Myrcella Baratheon/Robb Stark
Comments: 468
Kudos: 160





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

  * For [Semperlitluv](https://archiveofourown.org/users/Semperlitluv/gifts).



It was with little surprise that he saw that the clock read 4:53, because his alarm was going to go off at 5:00 and seven minutes was too much time to lie there thinking and not enough time to fall back asleep.

He turned off the alarm so it wouldn’t blare and got out of bed. There was a moment, a brief one, when he thought about just going into the bathroom but he turned back half a second later and returned to the bed, tossing the pillows to the bottom corner of the side he hadn’t slept in and then pulled the sheet back up, tucking it underneath the mattress and then the comforter as well. He grabbed the pillows and put them back in their correct spot and smoothed the blanket folded at the bottom of the bed that he never used.

With that done he padded into the bathroom and splashed some cold water on his face and brushed his teeth and went back into his room and pulled on running shorts and a t shirt, socks and his sneakers.

He walked down the hall and opened the door to Wes’ room and smiled for a moment seeing the way his son had kicked off all of his blankets and Grey Wind was lying on his back beside him, his paws crossed above him.

“Come on, boy,” he said quietly, and Grey Wind grunted. “ _Come._ ”

Grey Wind all but rolled out of bed and padded over to him, nuzzling his snout against his leg as Robb closed the door again. They walked down the stairs and into the kitchen and Robb opened the backdoor for Grey Wind and then his muscle memory allowed him to fill Grey Wind’s water and food bowls and fill his coffee maker with grounds and switch it on without giving any of it any thought. He was done by the time Grey Wind came back in the house and he closed the door before heading downstairs to the basement.

He flicked on the monitor from Wes’ room. The nightmares were far more infrequent now, but they still came every so often. Turning on the news he got on the treadmill and increased his speed and incline.

Every news station was saying the same thing. Stocks were up, the price of oil down, there was a war brewing on the other side of the world but that didn’t seem to bother them very much. He glanced at the monitor and saw Wes curled up on his side and then turned off the news and turned on music.

He increased his speed until he was at a brisk jog. He closed his eyes and imagined he was on pavement, feeling the wet cool air. Running outside was a rare treat for him now but he could still remember when it had been a chore, something he urged himself to do. One of those things that he swore he’d do whenever he’d eaten too much junk that week, to balance it. Back when running had been a task, rather than a solace.

When he clocked three miles he forced himself to slow to a walk and went another half mile before getting off.

Emails were waiting for him, but so was coffee, so he dragged himself back up the stairs and poured himself a cup, and brought Grey Wind back outside, grabbing the tennis ball on his way.

He sipped his coffee as he threw ball after ball. Gilly would give him a walk around 10 but this would tide him over until then. Grey Wind would run himself to death if there was a ball to chase after so Robb stopped after about twenty minutes and brought him back inside.

The morning unrolled like any other. He took his shower and got himself dressed and answered emails until 6:30 when he went into Wes’ room.

His son was still asleep, a beleaguered old teddy bear clutched in his arms. His long, dark lashes fluttered every so often. Still dreaming.

Robb placed his hand on his back and rubbed it gently, “Hey buddy, it’s time to wake up.”

“No it isn’t,” Wes informed him.

Robb bit his lip, waiting until he was sure he wouldn’t laugh before he said more firmly, “Come on, Wes, we’ve gotta get you ready for school.”

Wes yawned and shook his head, rolling over and taking hold of Robb’s arm. On weekends, Wes would wake up before dawn with no alarm. He’d be a ball of energy, him and Grey Wind trying to stealthily sneak into his bed. Every weekday morning though it was like his bones were made of lead.

“Well…,” Robb sighed, seeing the smile on Wes’ face. He lamented, “You asked for it.”

“ _No-o-o_ ,” Wes giggled as Robb got up and dragged him out of bed by his feet, holding him upside down and pressing kisses to his belly. “ _D-d-dadddyyyy I’m up!”_

Robb lifted him so that he could cradle him in his arms, “Are you sure?”

“Yes,” Wes promised, a giggle still waiting in his throat though as his whole body squirmed, “Yes I’m sure.”

“I don’t beliiiiieeve you,” Robb warned and attacked his belly again.

This sent him into another fit of laughter and shrieks and Grey Wind was jumping up trying to make sure his charge was safe and sound.

He settled him down and they walked through the halls.

“Alright, what are we thinking today?” Robb asked, “Cereal? Yogurt? Eggs?”

“Gilly made muffins,” Wes noted.

“She did?” Robb hadn’t seen them. “Where are they?”

“In the microwave,” Wes told him. “She thought they’d be safe there.”

Robb pursed his lips, “Safe. From what?”

“From you,” Wes informed him.

Robb’s mouth dropped open, “I _beg_ your pardon?”

Wes was unfussed by his horror and they went into the kitchen and he opened the microwave carefully, as though expecting a bomb. He looked inside and there _was_ a ziplock bag with muffins in there.

“She’s wily, that Gilly,” Robb muttered and grabbed two out, placing one down at Wes’ seat at the table.

He went into the fridge and grabbed out a small strawberry yogurt in a tube for him and poured him some water before pouring himself another cup of coffee and settling at the table with his own muffin.

The muffins were banana chocolate chip – his and Wes’ favorite – and they both tucked into them.

“What does wily mean?” Wes asked.

“Smart,” Robb told him, “But _mischievous_. Who does that remind you of?”

“I don’t know,” Wes demurred, his wide blue eyes lifting to the ceiling.

“Mm _hmmm_ ,” Robb agreed, polishing off his muffin and going into the microwave for another. “When you’re done with that will you grab me your folder? And not just the muffin, the yogurt too.”

Wes was a pretty good eater at home but sometimes was so distracted at school that he didn’t finish his lunch. Robb had been afraid something was wrong, anxiety or something, but the pediatrician had suggested just making sure he started the day off with enough energy to see him through. Gilly kept a watch for it too and always had snacks ready for him when he got home, and he’d get a full inventory of what had been left in the lunch box each night.

His son nodded, handing him the package of yogurt and Robb opened it for him before handing it back and took a big sip of coffee.

“Water,” Wes said.

“You have some,” Robb pointed out.

“For _you_ ,” Wes reminded him.

“Right,” Robb stood up, stroking Wes’ hair, “Thanks honey.”

He got himself a glass and resisted the urge to grab Wes’ folder for him. His teacher wanted the kids to _be responsible for it_ and while Robb didn’t think Wes had any issues with responsibility, he wasn’t going to contradict his teacher. His own parents had always presented a united front with his and his siblings’ teachers, even if he knew that they had privately had conversations with one or two of them.

Robb drained his glass of water. At first it started because he was thirsty but then he saw Wes’ eyes bugging out of his head so he stared at him as he drank the whole glass.

“ _That’s one!”_ Wes informed him using a voice like an umpire.

Yet another product of too much time with Uncle Theon. Though admittedly one of the least worrisome ones.

Once they finished their breakfasts he brought Wes up to his room to get dressed for school. There were the usual discussions about whether pajama pants were appropriate for school and where the word pajama came from and _no_ he didn’t want to wear the Thomas the Tank Engine t-shirt he wanted to wear the dragon t-shirt because dragons were cool and trains were lame and by the time it was over Robb needed another cup of coffee.

They haggled over rain boots (Wes won and Robb put them in his backpack but didn’t make him wear them) and music for the car (Robb won, and they were listening to indie rock and not the weird electronic music Rickon had brought with him on his last visit).

“Are you sure you don’t want to put on your rainboots?” Robb asked.

It wasn’t pouring, but rainboots could be worn every single day in the in the Riverlands, just like snowboots could be worn every day in the North. He had his waterproof Barbour coat on but was mildly regretting his Derbies.

“I’m sure,” Wes confirmed, “But can I be Hiccup?”

“If I get to be Hiccup next time,” Robb agreed.

His son thought that was a delightful compromise and Robb didn’t point out that he always agreed to it and yet it never seemed to be his turn. Even still, he knew that he only had another year or two in which his son would think it was cool to get a piggyback ride from him.

They grabbed Wes’ backpack and then Robb let him climb on, sprinting across the parking lot and up the stairs into the school. He dodged and rolled until Wes was shrieking with delight and then slowed as they neared his classroom.

“Good morning Wes,” his son’s teacher, Mr. Tarly greeted his son first and then him, “Hello Robb.”

“It’s actually _Toothless_ today,” Robb corrected, setting Wes down.

“Ah yes, I thought you looked a bit different,” Mr. Tarly agreed, making Robb smile.

He’d liked Mr. Tarly after first meeting him. Though he could be a bit skittish around the parents, particularly the _helicopter mommies (_ with their blown out hair and strict instructions about food and the importance of _decompression time_ and _can’t Thea practice her High Valyrian vocab at recess?)_ , he was great with the kids. Gentle and patient and full of useless information that they absorbed like the little data sponges they were.

“I filled out that permission slip,” he mentioned, “But I didn’t see anything about chaperones.”

Mr. Tarly smiled, “Oh, yes. I was going to send out a desperate plea with a healthy dose of guilt next week. It’s best to spread these things out… I find.”

Robb chuckled but narrowed his eyes, “Very devious of you.”

“Yes well,” Sam agreed, “It keeps me young… But why do you ask, would you be interested?”

“Wes, can you go put your backpack in your cubby, please?” Robb asked. Wes agreed and ran off to do just that. Mr. Tarly watched Wes leave and then turned back to him. “I’d like to… see how he interacts with the other kids?”

He was beginning to feel like a helicopter mommy himself, but since school had started a couple of weeks ago, his son hadn’t suggested a single playdate. Even when Robb had asked, his son had demurred. He didn’t seem sad about it, but it didn’t stop Robb from being a bit worried.

Mr. Tarly nodded sympathetically, “Well we’d be delighted to have you but actually in the past few days –“

“WES!” a little boy shouted as he entered the classroom, squeaking in his rain boots.

Wes had returned from his cubby and was trying to extricate himself from his still zipped raincoat, “Cole! Cool rain boots! I have ones just like them, want to see?”

Robb couldn’t quite believe what he was seeing mostly because, “Do you know how long I tried to convince him to wear _his_ rainboots today?” he asked Mr. Tarly.

He laughed and shrugged, “It’s best not to dwell, I find.”

Wes had run off with Cole and Robb watched as they ran to the cubbies and Wes pulled his backpack back out.

“Who is that?” Robb asked.

“Oh, that’s Cole Martell,” Mr. Tarly told him, “He is the son of… Myrcella!”

“Good morning, Mr. Tarly,” a bright voice said from behind him. Robb turned along with Mr. Tarly and smiled in what he hoped was a friendly manner at the Mom who’d just come in. “Sorry for my appearance, I forgot my scuba gear today.”

Though her son had come in wearing a rain coat and boots, she was wearing a pair of sneakers and jeans and a sweater but no coat. She was drenched.

She turned to him and smiled, holding out her hand, “Hi! I’m Myrcella Martell… we met at orientation. You’re Wes’ Dad, right?”

“I am,” he agreed, shaking her small hand, “Robb Stark.”

“Right!... Well I should go wrestle him into some sneakers. If I’m not back in five minutes, send reinforcements,” she suggested, making him and Mr. Tarly chuckle. She went to walk away and turned back, “Oh before I forget. Do you need chaperones for the field trip? I didn’t see a place to sign up on the form.”

“He’s spreading things out,” Robb informed her. Without any context. Like an idiot.

She looked at him for a moment and then turned to Mr. Tarly and nodded, pointing to his head, “Not just a hat rack, I see.”

“Yes, well,” Mr. Tarly blushed, and she turned away.

He would be lying if he said they didn’t both watch her go. It was admittedly a little difficult not to. He remembered meeting her at orientation. At first, she’d looked like another one of the terrifying helicopter mommies, but her questions had been different, focused more on how they could reinforce the lessons the kids were learning at school at home.

Robb turned away as Mr. Tarly did and they both looked at each other for a moment before Robb asked, “Are Wes and Cole becoming friends?”

Mr. Tarly smiled, “They were paired up the other day and really took to each other. Cole is very social, admittedly a little _too_ social at times, so I thought they could… rub off on each other.”

Robb pointed to his head and nodded, “Not just a pretty face, huh?” Mr. Tarly blushed and Robb stopped teasing, “Thanks. Really, thank you. He’s a good kid? Cole, I mean.”

Mr. Tarly nodded earnestly, “He’s a wonderful boy. A _little_ chatty but never disrespectful, very kind, and a real emphasis on fairness.”

Robb had to admit that he did sound like a perfect fit for Wes. He had always been comfortable with adults, and though he’d been friendly with kids in preschool, he’d never really had a _friend_. The only kid his own age that he got on especially well with was his cousin Lya, but she lived in the North and they only got to see each other about once a month.

“Pull Wes, _pulllll_ ,” they heard from across the room.

Robb turned to look and saw Myrcella cradling her son as Wes tried to yank off his rain boots. The two boys were laughing like crazy.

“A little chatty, huh?” Robb asked Mr. Tarly, a grin on his face.

“Yes, well,” Mr. Tarly trailed off before turning to explain that he would not be giving the kindergarteners a midterm.

***

“So why don’t you tell me a little bit about yourself,” Dr. Dayne suggested.

Myrcella smoothed her dressed, adjusting her ankles and nodded, “Well, my name is Myrcella Martell, which you know. I’m a mother to my son, Cole, he’s five years old, just started kindergarten,” at that she contorted her face in pain and Dr. Dayne smiled politely so Myrcella cleared her throat briefly and said, “And there’s not very much to know, really. I’m quite boring.”

“With due respect, I doubt that,” Dr. Dayne told her, “Why don’t you tell me what brought you in today?”

“Oh,” Myrcella smiled, “My cousin Shireen – she’s truly more like a sister to me than anything else – asked me to and she’s so important to me, so I agreed.”

“Myrcella, or would you prefer Mrs. Martell?” Dr. Dayne asked.

“Oh, Myrcella, please,” she agreed.

Dr. Dayne pointed to the wall, “Would you look up there and tell me what you see, please?”

Myrcella followed her finger and then glanced back at Dr. Dayne, “Diplomas.”

Dr. Dayne took off her truly enviable eyeglasses and started to clean them, “From Vale University and the Citadel.”

“Those are good schools,” Myrcella noted. “I almost went to Vale but I decided to… you weren’t finished, were you?”

“No, Mrs. Martell,” Dr. Dayne smiled. “I’ve been a therapist for eighteen years dealing with all kinds, I assure you, and the thing is… I really _didn’t care for_ some of my patients. Just flat out couldn’t stand them. But guess what? That doesn’t matter. I’m a professional and that means that I am going to do my job whether I like you or not. But the thing is, Mrs. Martell, I can’t do my job if you are so focused on getting me to like you that you aren’t honest with me. So, Mrs. Martell. Are you going to let me do my job, or are you going to waste $350 an hour?”

“I’m…,” Myrcella started. She wanted to ask if she was allowed to speak to a patient that way, but that wasn’t the sort of thing she’d ever say. Except – “Are you allowed to speak to me that way?”

“Yes,” Dr. Dayne noted. “So, Mrs. Martell? How would you like to proceed?”

“With all due respect, Dr. Dayne, you may have been a therapist for eighteen years but I’ve been a mother for five and in order to do _my_ job correctly, I don’t give into tantrums,” Myrcella noted, “And not for nothing but you haven’t been _my_ therapist for eighteen years you’ve been my therapist for less than eighteen minutes so forgive me if I don’t feel at _all_ comfortable sharing my deepest feelings with you.”

“Mrs. Martell I –“

“And I asked you to call me Myrcella!” she added.

Dr. Dayne smirked, “Well done. I had it pegged it would take you the full hour to correct me.”

Myrcella looked at her incredulously. The doctor met her gaze. She had peculiar violet eyes and the confidence of a woman that had always been beautiful and brilliant. She tilted her head to the side and a laugh bubbled up from within Myrcella’s chest.

“Is this how you’re going to be every session?” she wondered.

“With all due respect,” Dr. Dayne said, “Only if you keep up the bullshit.”

“Fair enough,” Myrcella agreed. It wasn’t easy to adjust her posture, but she did, relaxing slightly and brought one thigh up over the other. “The truth is. I don’t really know why I’m here.”

“That’s not uncommon,” Dr. Dayne admitted, “There are some people who come here with what we call a _foot-in-the-door_ issue. It’s an easily identifiable thing – they can’t sleep or they’ve just gotten divorced. Something they can point to – or more often, others can – to justify the first visit. But it’s very rare that there is just a single reason to seek out assistance.”

“So why do you ask?” Myrcella wondered.

Dr. Dayne shrugged, “For a number of reasons. It’s a fairly obvious question, so it makes sense to have as an early one. And for another, it usually gives me a bit of insight into who the person is.”

Myrcella nodded, “I’m going to actively suppress the urge to ask what _my_ answer told you.” 

Dr. Dayne said, “I’ll tell you at the end if you’d like to know. But for now, why don’t you tell me why your cousin…Shireen is it? Why you think she asked you to come here.”

Myrcella leaned down and reached into her bag, pulling out her reusable water bottle and took a small sip.

“She thinks I’m unhappy,” Myrcella told her. “Or lonely, maybe? But who can be lonely when they are never alone?”

“Lots of people,” Dr. Dayne told her.

Myrcella took another stalling sip and nodded, “I suppose that’s true.”

She reached briefly into the neck of her dress and stuck her finger through the circle hanging off of her necklace, taking a deep breath before lowering her hands to her lap.

“This summer marked five years since my husband passed away,” she noted, knowing that it was already in her file anyway. Knowing that she hadn’t mentioned a husband. She glanced at Dr. Dayne and said, “And I think around year two people expect you to go back to the person you were, but I just… I don’t think that is possible for me. And I’m okay with that, I am, truly. But I think for others… they miss who I was. And I’ve disappointed them by failing to… well to be the person they knew.”

“What makes you think Shireen is disappointed?” Dr. Dayne asked.

“Well,” Myrcella wondered, “Would she have suggested therapy if she thought everything was rosy?”

“Fair point,” Dr. Dayne allowed, “But I think there is a difference between concern and disappointment.”

“I think that is what I would like to stop,” Myrcella admitted, “Shireen, my brothers, two of them anyway, my uncle. They’re all concerned for me. Because they can’t understand that I’ve accepted my life as it is. I am blessed – no, _no_ , I’m not saying that to make you like me. I mean it. My son fills me with joy and I have family members that love me and I have my health and that is a _lot_ to be grateful for.”

“I agree with you,” Dr. Dayne told her, which was somewhat surprising. “That is a good deal to be grateful for. And I don’t doubt that you are, grateful. But wanting more for yourself doesn’t mean you’re ungrateful for all that you have.”

“And what if I don’t?” she wondered. “What if I’m… content. As I am. As my life is.”

“Are you?” Dr. Dayne asked.

“I don’t know,” Myrcella admitted, “Who knows that sort of thing? Are there things in my life I’d change? Sure. Starting with my living room and I’m going to ask for your decorator’s name to do it.”

“Don’t try to make me like you,” Dr. Dayne pointed at her.

“Give me their name,” Myrcella pointed at her.

Her laugh was surprisingly girlish for such an imposing woman and it relaxed Myrcella slightly. She had said it to break the tension, but it was true. She had imagined a dark room fit for contemplation, but Dr. Dayne’s office was airy without seeming like the site of a yoga retreat and cozy without appearing like a grandmother’s cottage. It spoke of a woman with impeccable taste and an unflinching eye.

“Would you tell me about your husband?” Dr. Dayne asked.

“No,” Myrcella admitted. “Not today.”

Dr. Dayne nodded, “Alright. How about your son?”

A smile overtook her face and she said, “His name is Cole. As I said he’s five years old and just began kindergarten. He’s a wonderful boy – I know that I’m biased, but everyone else seems to think so too. He’s very intelligent, which is great. But he’s very kind and thoughtful. And… you know, he’s _five_. He has his moments as all kids do, and he’s a horrible flirt-,” at that Dr. Dayne laughed once again, “But he really just… wears his soul on the outside.”

“He sounds lovely,” Dr. Dayne told her. “Does he have a lot of friends?”

Myrcella nodded, “He does. He’s very social. Possibly a little _too_ social, but he t-well that’s just who he is. He’s recently befriended a very sweet boy in his class, who hadn’t really made many friends yet. I mean, it’s only been a few weeks! There’s nothing wrong with this boy of course, he seems like an angel. I just… think Cole has a sense for those who need a little help.”

Dr. Dayne could have pressed her on that but she didn’t and said, “That’s a wonderful quality.”

Myrcella nodded and glanced at her watch, “It looks like our time is nearly up.”

“Yes,” Dr. Dayne glanced at her own. “So, will you come back?”

Myrcella found herself nodding before she’d made the decision to do so, but said, “I will.”

“Good,” Dr. Dayne noted, “I have some homework for you.”

“Could have told me that before I agreed,” Myrcella quipped and Dr. Dayne ignored her.

“It’s simple, really,” Dr. Dayne said, “But every day I would like you to do a little something for yourself.”

Myrcella’s brow furrowed, “A little something for myself? What makes you think I don’t spend all day doing things for myself?”

“Because, Myrcella,” Dr. Dayne told her, “I’ve been doing this for 18 years.”

Myrcella laughed and with a roll of her eyes stood up. She bent down and grabbed her bag, slipping her water bottle back into its special pocket and then hooked the bag over her shoulder.

“Thank you,” she gave her a small wave, and headed towards the door. She opened it and turned back, wondering, “Can this count for today? My little something?”

“No,” Dr. Dayne said with a small smile, “You came here for Shireen, remember?”

Myrcella closed the door with a laugh and went through the lobby and down the elevator. The rain had long stopped but it was still overcast and the air was wet so she hurried to her car, wishing she’d remembered to bring her coat inside.

She drove through the light city traffic that became more congested as she neared Cole’s school. It was still a few minutes before it would let out for the day but even still she impatiently tapped her steering wheel, waiting for the light to change.

While she did, she realized that she’d forgotten to ask Dr. Dayne what her answer had told her about her. Perhaps it was better that she didn’t know. She wondered if Dr. Dayne noted that she hadn’t asked.

_Don’t try to make me like you._

She wouldn’t deny to herself that she had been trying. Though, in her opinion, it was hardly a character flaw to want people to like you. And it wasn’t as though she was terribly vain, she had always just been more comfortable when those around her were comfortable.

Myrcella pulled into a parking spot and grabbed her lightweight coat and her bag and headed towards the school, looping both over her arm.

She waved to a few parents that she recognized as she headed into the classroom.

“Mommy!” Cole’s bright voice called and she opened her arms to him.

As he rushed into them she felt that familiar and yet never dull sense of happiness. She knew she only had a couple more years when he’d run into her arms, especially in front of his friends, and she’d savor it as long as she had it.

“Did you have a good day?” she asked.

“Yeah!” he agreed, like usual. “Mr. Tarly read us _The Day the Crayons Quit_.”

“Did that beige crayon find their clothes?” she wondered.

“No-O- _o_ -o,” Cole laugh-answered. “Wes’ favorite is the green crayon, just like me!”

“That Wes has got some great taste, doesn’t he?” she wondered, loud enough that Wes and the woman he was with could hear. They stopped as she’d wanted them to and she smiled at Wes, as Cody rested against her legs, “Oh good, you’re here. I have an important question for you, Wes, are you ready?”

Wes looked at her in excitement and then adorably looked up at the woman who he is was who nodded down at him.

“ _If_ you had to say,” she noted, “What is the true color of the sun?”

Wes’ answer was surprisingly vehement when he answered, “Yorange!”

“Yorange!” she laughed, “That’s better than ours, isn’t it, baby?”

Cole nodded and explained, “We call it Orellow.”

At that Wes let out an adorable giggle that beckoned her own.

She looked at the woman and held out her hand, “I’m Cole’s Mom, Myrcella Martell.”

“Gilly Craster,” the woman shook her head, a smile landing in her pretty brown eyes. “Wes’ babysits me in the afternoons. Isn’t that right?”

“Noooo,” Wes smiled.

“No wait,” Myrcella thought about it, “You two went to college together.”

“ _Noooo I’m five,_ ” Wes giggled again.

Cole looked up at her smiling but his eyes were drooping a bit. She stroked her hand through his hair and turned back to Gilly.

“Well we should be going but we should set up a p-l-a-y—”

“D-A-T-E,” Cole finished exuberantly.

She clamped her hand over his mouth but admitted, “What he said. If you think Wes’ Dad would be okay with that?”

“Oh please Gilly,” Wes wrapped his arms around her legs.

Gilly smiled down at him, brushing hair off his forehead, “I’ll talk to Robb tonight.”

A pair of blue eyes flashed before her eyes quickly and Myrcella shook her head, banishing them.

“Great,” Myrcella agreed, “And you could come over with him, if that would make you all more comfortable, not that you have to, of course. Whatever you want.”

Gilly smiled at her kindly, “I’ll let him know. It was nice meeting you. We’ve got to get his things together, but we’ll see you both tomorrow.”

“Have a nice day,” she agreed, looking at Cole’s cubby to make sure he hadn’t left anything.

As she did, she saw Mr. Tarly greet Gilly with a little wave that she returned equally demurely before heading to Wes’ cubby.

“Ready baby?” she asked.

“Yeah, can I have cuddle-walk though?” Cody asked.

She leaned down and cradled him up in her arms and he tucked his head into the crook of her neck as she walked him out of the school. He wrapped his arms around her neck, holding a lock of her hair.

And if Dr. Dayne had asked her right then if she was content, she would have answered without hesitating. 


	2. Chapter 2

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> So this chapter starts later that same day. I promise the pacing won't stay this way (and I'm not sure that the chapter lengths will either) but I wanted to sort of get everything established, and give a better indication of their lives and what not. I don't think this will constitute a slow burn for people who like slow burns, but it will likely be a slower burn that you'd be used to if you read a lot my works. 
> 
> I have to say though, I'm so so so excited about this. The structure of it is evolving slowly for me but I have lots and lots of scenes already planned out between this sweet pair.

“It’s a good deal,” his Uncle Edmure noted.

“A good deal with a bad company isn’t a good deal,” Robb pointed out.

He saw his Great Uncle Brynden’s eyes twinkle, but Robb ignored him. He didn’t mean to use that tone with his uncle but the man had been so desperate to prove himself after his father died that he’d made his share of mistakes recently. Robb knew it also had to do with the fact that he was upset he’d been passed over, and the fact that he’d been passed over for Robb along with his loyalty as a nephew meant that he usually tried to keep his disagreements with him private.

“The Freys’ company is nearly as old as ours,” Edmure argued.

“Is old the same as good?” Uncle Brynden asked, “Look at you, and look at him.”

His Uncle Brynden did not share his restraint when it came to Edmure. Robb sighed and rubbed his face. He looked at his watch and saw that it was almost 5:45.

“I’ve got to head out,” he told them, standing up.

The end of the day was the one area that was not up for discussion. He would be back on emails and meetings after Wes went to bed but between six and eight, Monday through Friday, he was one hundred percent unavailable.

“At least let me have Risk look into the specifics,” Uncle Edmure suggested.

Robb was already done with the conversation but he agreed, “That’s fine. They did something with the Boltons a while back. Have them start there.” He grabbed his cell off the table and looked up at them. “Do either of you want to come for dinner? Gilly’s making… something I don’t know what, but it’ll be good.”

Brynden looked at Edmure who answered, “No, thanks, Robb. I’ve got some things to catch up on.”

Brynden then turned to him, “Love to.”

Edmure sighed and left the room and Robb shook his head. They grabbed their things and walked out to the parking lot.

“You know he’s not working right?” Uncle Brynden asked.

“Who?” Robb wondered, “Oh. I didn’t give it much thought.”

Brynden smirked, “He’s after that Frey girl. Rose?”

“Roslin?” Robb wondered. They’d met a few times in passing over the years. “Isn’t she younger than me?”

Brynden scoffed, “That’s what he likes about her.”

Robb rolled his eyes, “You may not like him but he’s not a _predator_.”

“Who said anything about him being a predator?” he asked, “He likes younger women because they like his car and house and don’t worry whether or not he has a lick of sense.”

Robb chuckled, slapping him on the back before getting into his car. It was a short drive to his house and as the company’s headquarters predated much of the city, he thankfully didn’t have to drive through any areas of traffic.

They made it there quickly and Robb got out of his car and then watched as his Uncle Brynden did the same. His grandfather’s younger brother, he had always seemed a titan to him, especially when he was a boy. Since his grandfather’s death though he had seemed to age at a much more rapid speed. He was still in good health, he just seemed almost faded in a way. Less sharp, his movements lacking the precision he’d always associated with him.

“What are you standing around for?” Brynden asked him and Robb couldn’t help but smirk.

Age had done nothing to soften his manners.

“Just wanted to make sure I didn’t need to give you a hand,” Robb noted, dodging away when his uncle went to kick him.

He opened the door, “Honeyyyyyy I’m _hooooooooome_.”

“DADDYDADDYDADDYDADDY,” an excited voice cried.

And just like that. Every annoying email, every frustrating meeting, all of it was eradicated instantly.

He bent down just in time for his son to launch himself in his arms and he squeezed him tightly, stroking his soft hair.

“Uncle Bryndennnnnn,” Wes nearly gurgled in delight.

“Get out of my _way_ Robb,” his uncle ordered, and Robb dutifully relinquished his son.

He let Brynden and Wes greet one another, Wes talking rapidly at him. Though Wes had been fond of his grandfather, his health had precluded him from being as fun as _Uncle Brynden_ , who could rival dragons on his best day.

Gilly was in the kitchen, lifting a large serving bowl off the counter. 

“Here give me that,” he stepped forward and took it from her.

“Bless you,” Gilly smiled.

“Oh yes, clearly the larger glory goes to me,” he teased and nodded his head towards the table and she smiled in affirmation.

He brought it over to the table and smirked, looking at the spread. He glanced at Gilly and she raised her brow and he nodded.

“Hullooo Miss Gilly,” Brynden greeted her as he came in fireman’s carrying Wes.

“Ah Mr. Tully, a _pleasure_ ,” Gilly greeted him obsequiously.

“Gilly can you stay?” he asked her.

“Pleeeeeeeeease,” Wes added.

Had Gilly had any thought of turning down his offer, it went out the window then. She nodded with a smile, allowing Wes to guide her to _her_ chair and they all settled around.

“This smells great,” Brynden told her, “What is it?”

Gilly started fumbling with the serving utensils as he made sure Wes was settled into his booster seat and had his sleeves rolled up.

“Vegtuhbul curry,” it fell to Wes to answer.

“I’m sorry… what was that word you said before curry?” Brynden asked.

Wes turned to him and enunciated even more clearly, “Veg- _tuh_ -bul.”

Brynden looked at him and Robb looked back, his Uncle then looked at Gilly who looked down at her lap.

“CONSPIRATORS,” he pointed at them, “You planned this!”

“Did we?” Robb asked Gilly.

She was still looking down at her lap and then covered her mouth in her hand and a hysterical laugh bubbled up from her.

“We were so close!” he admonished her.

She looked up, and all but growled, “I’m sorry! You know I’m a terrible liar,” then looked at Brynden at and said more sweetly, “Eat it, it’s good for you.”

“And it’s yummy,” Wes noted.

Robb stood up to put separate piles of rice and curry and snap peas on his plate.

“And _he’s_ four,” Robb noted.

Brynden grumbled at that and accepted the things as he passed them, taking dainty little portions. They’d played this game before. When no one was looking, Brynden would put _just a bit more_ on. And then again. And again.

They all loaded up their plates and dug in. It was delicious, and he and Gilly had conspired the day before. She was a wonderful cook, was very good about appealing to while expanding Wes’ palette. On top of that she was an amazing nanny, and dog walker, and occasional housekeeper, and person.

Most of the time, he wasn’t sure how they’d get through the weeks without her.

“So how was school?” Brynden asked Wes.

“Gorfnsn,” Wes answered as he gnarled on a snap pea.

Brynden looked at him and Robb answered, “That was ‘good’.” He looked at Wes, “What did you do?”

“We learned how to count by ten,” Wes told them proudly.

“You didn’t tell me that!” Gilly protested.

“Sorry,” Wes told her with an innocent smile which Gilly was helpless at not returning. Then looked at Uncle Brynden, “Wanna hear?”

“You bet your a-,” Brynden started until Robb leaned behind Wes and his uncle smiled and said, “You bet.”

“Ten, twenty, thirty,” Wes started proudly and then looked at him and went on, “Forty,” Robb opened his mouth in surprise and Wes said louder, “ _FIFTY_ , SIXTY,” he turned to Gilly, “SEVENDYYY, ATEY, NINDY, ONE. HUN.DER.ED.”

“THE CROWD GOES WILD,” Gilly intoned as Robb banged his fists on the table.

Wes wiggled in his chair and then scooped up a bunch of curry and brought it to his mouth. Or at least some of it went to his mouth. At least 75%. Maybe 65.

They all kept eating and Gilly had to look away when Brynden took another serving of curry. It was nice to have Brynden here, to liven them all up a bit. He and Wes loved when Gilly stayed for dinner, but Brynden was a much rarer get and he entertained them all with tales of his misadventures.

“So what else did you do then?” Brynden asked as they were nearly finished.

“Oh we read _The Day the Crayons Quit,_ and GUESS what Cole and his Mommy think the true color of the sun is?” Wes asked.

Golden hair flashed before his eyes and he dismissed it, “Not… _yorange_?’

“Nooo,” Wes said and then looked at Gilly, “What did he say?”

Gilly looked at him and said, “Orellow.”

“Orellow,” Robb repeated and it took him a moment to realize he was smiling. He cleared his throat and turned to Wes, “That may be better than yorange.”

Wes nodded solemnly, scrunching his nose considering it, and then shaking his head, “I still like yorange.”

Robb stroked his hair and then identified the amount of food on his plate he had to eat to be done, down to the grain of rice.

“Remind me I have to talk to you about that,” Gilly said. Robb glanced at Wes’ plate, wondering if he’d identified too much or too little. Wondering if Wes’ lunchbox had been full or if he’d eaten a big afternoon snack. Gilly tapped the table and said softly, “Cole.”

She smiled, which allowed him to not be nervous that something that gone wrong with Wes’ new friend. He didn’t want to even think about how tough it would be if the first kid he connected with rejected him in some way.

When they’d all finished, Brynden looked at Wes, “How about you and I go play trains while this lot do the dishes.”

“YAAAAAAAA,” Wes agreed, running out of the room.

To Robb’s relief, Gilly looked equally annoyed. So clearly, he was not the only one who had been read the _no trains_ riot act.

“This was delicious, by the way,” Robb told her. “I can’t remember if I told you that.”

“You didn’t,” Gilly noted, “But the drool was _very_ eloquent.”

He chuckled and picked up the plates, stacking one on top of the other. Gilly picked up the bowl of rice.

“ _I_ am doing the dishes,” he told her.

“I’m just clearing,” she promised and they set about their tasks.

He set himself up at the sink, turning the water on and rinsing the plates and throwing them in the dishwasher. Somehow by the time he’d gotten all the residual food off of those and the utensils they’d all used, Gilly had cleared the table and pulled out the exact right size containers to store the leftovers in.

“Think he’ll take some home with him?” she wondered.

“His ego’d never allow it,” Robb pointed out, “Will you take some home?”

“My roommate hates the smell,” she lamented, “But I’ll have it here for lunch tomorrow.”

“Your roommate is such a grouch,” he said as he took the bowl that had held the curry and the one that had held the rice.

“I know,” she nodded, “But she’s clean and pays on time and hasn’t ever stolen from me. So, she’s still the best roommate I’ve ever had.”

“I’m giving you a raise,” he determined, cleaning the curry bowl with a soapy sponge. He heard her laugh behind him and he turned indignantly, “I’m serious.”

“I know you are, but no,” Gilly argued. “I’m already _criminally_ overpaid. Having a roommate is my _choice_.”

He had always respected that about her, so he said nothing as took the bowl that still had a snap pea in it, popping it into his mouth.

She had joined their family when Wes was three. She was twenty-five at the time and was the most serious person he’d ever met when it came to adults and herself, only to turn into a human marshmallow with Wes.

It had been both aspects of her that had made him hire her. He liked that she took it seriously and her quiet nature, though it was clear that she hadn’t been born with it but taught it. He was quiet then too though, and she didn’t trample over him. Over time he grew less quiet as did she and the marshmallow had a spine of steel when Wes – admittedly rarely – got out of line.

He’d been desperate when he hired her, his previous nanny had left him in a lurch, but had he interview a thousand candidates, rather than seven, he couldn’t have chosen better.

And there was nothing frivolous about her. She could have her own apartment if she wanted to, he had made sure that he paid her enough for that at the start and he gave her a raise about once every six months because she deserved it. But even though she could afford it, she wouldn’t do it, because she could remember when she couldn’t. And she was saving up for the next time she was in that position.

That would never happen while he was alive but she didn’t like to hear that, so he said nothing.

“I just think you could have chosen _better_ ,” he pointed out.

“Ugh I know,” Gilly agreed, hopping up on the counter and picking up one of the bowls to dry. He tried to grab it back, but she waved him off, “Only… 10 more months left with her though.”

Robb smirked, “Not that you’re counting down the days or anything.”

“Of course not,” Gilly agreed, holding her hand out for the next one.

“So, you wanted to talk to me about Cole,” he reminded her.

“Oh right,” Gilly agreed, “So we were talking to him and his Mom,” Green eyes, but paler. Rain on long eyelashes. Robb nodded at Gilly. “And she suggested a playdate for the boys. They both seemed _very_ into the idea.”

Robb smiled, “Really?”

Gilly nodded, a smile on her face too, “Yeah, and Cole seems like _such_ a sweet boy. Wes can’t stop talking about him.”

“That’s such a relief,” Robb admitted, “Was I crazy for being worried? I just feel like… I don’t know like I’m going to fuck him up. Sansa tells me _all_ parents feel like that but… well you’ve met Lya.”

Gilly nodded, her eyes wide as though she was still traumatized from the last visit. Robb chuckled, because while his niece was sweet natured she was also exuberant, and after a couple of years nannying for Wes, Gilly had fallen asleep on the couch before dinner the last time she’d been here.

“For what it’s worth, I don’t think you’re crazy for worrying,” Gilly noted. “I _do_ think you’re crazy for thinking you’re going to mess him up. You’re not the type of Dad who does that.”

She didn’t have to say it, he heard it. He patted the back of her hand and grabbed the sponge and brought it over to the table.

“How’d you leave it with her?” he asked as he wiped off the table.

“I told her I’d talk to you about it,” Gilly noted, “Oh! And I think she was offering to have Wes over there, because she offered for me to come as well if you’d be more comfortable.”

Robb’s brow furrowed, walking back to the sink, “Do you think she was just looking for you to babysit Cole too?”

The quickness with which Gilly denied that suggestion took him by surprise, “She really doesn’t seem like the type. I think she just… she probably has seen that Wes hasn’t had playdates and wanted to be sensitive to that.”

“That’s nice of her,” Robb noted.

“Well,” Gilly suggested, “I think she _is_ nice. She shouldn’t be, but I think she is.”

Robb didn’t ask her what she meant. Myrcella Martell was the sort of woman who never would have had to be nice. Obviously wealthy, undeniably beautiful, she’d been graded on a curve her whole life.

Even still, it was nice. For her to offer that. And she’d seemed nice, the couple of times they’d met. And the few times he’d seen her at drop-off with Cole.

Cole. And Wes.

“I’ll talk to her tomorrow if I see her in the morning,” he agreed, “Otherwise you should feel free to set it up whenever works for you. And she’s right… maybe just the first time you could be there?”

Gilly started making a propeller noise.

“I know, I know, I know,” he groaned, “Now go home. Or go out. Are you seeing what’s-his-face?”

“You know his name, Robb,” Gilly rolled her eyes, heading towards the back stairs and calling up, “Gooooodbye Wes, Goooodbye Brynden. NEXT TIME YOU COME I’LL MAKE STEAK!” They heard Wes and Brynden calling out goodbyes and Robb walked her to the door and opened it. “But you can forget it now. That’s over.”

“What did he do?” he asked.

“Nothing,” Gilly said. He fixed her with a look, and she said, “Literally nothing. He stopped texting two weeks ago.”

“What an idiot,” Robb scoffed, “I’m glad I never learned his name… _or looked up his home address_.”

She made the propeller noise again and he pretended to kick her out the door.

She walked out into the driveway and he called, “You good to drive?”

“Promise,” she agreed, waving at him.

He thanked her and closed the door and went upstairs to see what Wes and Brynden were up to. They were sprawled out on the floor, and had set up a very elaborate scene. It looked as though a few trains had gotten into a pile up. And there was a dinosaur standing on a bridge.

“King’s Landing?” he guessed and Brynden smirked.

He sat on Wes bed and they played for a little bit longer and then Brynden took his leave. It was 7:30 by the time he was gone though so Robb got Wes into his pajamas and his teeth brushed and had him pick out some books.

“Can we read in the big bed?” Wes asked.

Robb nodded and they and Grey Wind went down the hall and piled into his bed. He read one book and then the next, Wes read half the third and then looked up at him.

“Can we watch Mommy?” he asked.

Every night Robb feared he’d ask that. Every night Robb feared he wouldn’t.

“For a few minutes,” Robb agreed, pulling his phone out of his pocket. “Before you, or after you?”

“After!” Wes exulted.

Robb went into one of his albums and pulled up a video of the day Wes had taken his first steps.

_“Come to Mommy, honey,”_ her velvety voice pleaded. “ _You’re doing it! Robb he’s doing it.”_

He could hear his awestruck laughter, the camera shaking slightly as Wes fell into Jeyne’s arms.  
  


_“You did it, you did it,”_ she was kissing Wes up and down his cheeks and Wes, laying against him now, laughed at the sound of his younger self’s gurgle-laugh. “ _Can you go to Daddy?”_

_“Come to Daddy, Wes!_ ” he heard himself agree.

Wes, at eleven months, had an adorably determined look on his face as he got out of Jeyne’s arms and started walking over. Though the focus of the video was on Wes, Jeyne’s delight was clear on her face, her silky brown hair piled up on top of her head.

He watched as Wes fell against him and he and Jeyne started cheering.

“ _He’s so big,”_ Jeyne cried.

_“Can you come to Daddy too?”_ Robb heard himself plead.

She laughed and the camera was on her as she slid across the floor. It lost focus for a second as she climbed into his lap, stuck on her fuzzy sweater. The camera refocused and Robb’s heart seized.

He could still remember what it felt like when she looked at him the way she was then.

“ _He’s walking,”_ she told him.

“ _He’s walking,”_ he murmured stupidly. Then grinned, “ _Guess it’s time…”_

_“Robb!”_ she squealed and he remembered that he’d grabbed her ass. Her voice had taken on its bedroom quality as she told him, “ _Not in front of the baby. Or on camera.”_

_“But yes?”_ he asked.

He closed his eyes. He couldn’t watch her kiss him. It was better when he didn’t think about her lips against his.

“ _But yes,”_ she cooed, “ _Yes, yes, yes._ ”

The video ended and Wes looked up at him, “One more?”

Robb looked down at him and nodded, “One more.”

***

“Can you tell me a story about Daddy?” Cole asked as she tucked him into bed.

He was having one of those nights. The nights where he lingered over his dinner and couldn’t figure out which books he wanted to read. He had interrupted all the way through his favorite Gerald and Piggie book _I Am Going!_ and looked through his pajama drawer so many times that she finally just pulled out a pair of spaceship ones and closed the drawer.

Bedtime had become a bit of a struggle since he’d turned five that summer. His pediatrician had told her it was normal, that as his mind was expanding, so were his fears. She could understand that, but it broke her heart to know that her son was afraid to go to sleep because of what he would see. He was supposed to dream of friendly dragons and great adventures. She wanted him to know he was safe even in his sleep.

This request had been happening more and more recently. It was her own fault. One night his screams had terrified her so much that when she’d crawled into bed with him it had only been partly for his benefit, and she’d tried to think of something that would calm them both.

She stroked his dark curls and nodded, “A quick one, okay? Do you want one you’ve heard, or a new one?”

“A new one,” Cole agreed, snuggling deeper against her.

She rubbed his little back as she thought about one and then smiled, “Have I told you about your Daddy’s and my first date?” Cole shook his head and Myrcella thought about how to start, “ _Well, I was very nervous because he was very handsome. There had never been any boy or man that I wanted to go on a date with quite so much as him. We were meant to go out for dinner on a Friday night, some fancy restaurant – Auntie Shireen nearly fainted when I told her the name. And on Thursday night I was coming out of work, and there he was!”_

“But you hate surprises,” Cole told her.

“I know!” she agreed, “And it wasn’t very nice of him to give me _no warning_ was it?” Cole shook his head vehemently, his loyalty wrapping around her heart like vines. She let Trystane off the hook though and went on, “ _Well I gave him a piece of my mind. I said, “What do you think you’re doing here? I’m not ready for you.” And your Daddy looked mad – not angry, but craaaazy – and he said, “I don’t think I can wait.” And I laughed and asked, “You’re used to getting your own way, aren’t you?” And he smiled and said, “No more than you.”_ Which was true. And I really was just as impatient to see him. So I said, _“You’ll still take me to dinner tomorrow night?” and your Daddy smiled and said, “And every night after if you’ll let me.”_

“Did you go?” Cole asked.

“Yeah, baby,” she noted, “I went. And he took me to a small little restaurant down a side street, that wasn’t fancy or special or anything. But it didn’t matter. Because he couldn’t wait to see me, and I couldn’t wait to see him.”

“Did he?” Cole asked, “Take you for dinner every night after?”

Myrcella blushed, trying not to think too much of those early days with Trystane. They had been so unbelievably and simultaneously mad for one another. They’d spent every night of that first month together. He’d told her he loved her week three, she realized she loved him week four but didn’t buck up the courage to tell him until week six.

“He did,” she told him.

Cole looked up at her, “He kept his promise.”

“All of them,” she told him.

_Almost_ , a voice whispered.

She smiled at Cole and asked, “Are you ready for bed, baby?”

He nodded bravely and she kissed his head and tucked him in, making sure that his nightlight was on and leaving the door to his room slightly ajar.

The hall light was on, as it would be all night. Not for the first time she considered getting a dog. She had never had one, but it might be good for Cole. Give him a little more security. Maybe the dog could even sleep with him. She knew that the bond between a boy and a dog could be very strong.

She wouldn’t mind having one either. Her mother had never let them have one when she was growing up but she always liked to pet dogs she saw on the street. And it would give her a sense of security too. Not that the security system she had didn’t, and the Riverlands were incredibly safe, particularly the city of Riverrun.

Making a mental note to do some research about breeds before bed, she went back down to the kitchen to clean up from dinner. She’d put the chicken away, not liking to leave it out even for a little while, but everything else was exactly where she’d left it. One of the Mom’s she knew in Cole’s class had lamented, “ _They all just leave things around the house as though little fairies come and pick them up.”_ She remembered noting, “ _I must have misplaced my wings, then._ ”

She had felt unkind at the time for thinking that the woman had a husband and a full time nanny. Not only because the woman had three children, but also because Myrcella knew better than anyone that it was impossible to know what someone else was living through.

Myrcella had never wanted to have a nanny. Because she didn’t officially work, she had never felt right about it, and she was able to get everything for the charities she worked with done while Cole was at school.

Even still, occasionally, at the end of the day she wouldn’t have minded walking back into a clean kitchen.

That was not to be though, and her muscle memory took over as she transferred the leftovers to plastic containers and washed this dish and that, scrubbed that counter, loaded the coffee for the next morning, prepped Cole’s lunch.

When she was content that everything was tidy, she went back upstairs. She peaked her head into Cole’s room and was relieved to see him already asleep, wrapped up in his covers like a burrito.

Contented, she walked down the hall to the laundry room and pulled a load out of the dryer before depositing the freshly clean one into it. She pulled out a pair of her jeans and a too fluffy sweatshirt of Cole’s and hung them up, before bringing the basket into her bedroom.

She sat in her chair by the bay windows and started to fold, making neat little piles. Cole’s shirt, her shirt, Cole’s underwear, Cole’s shirt, her underwear, her shirt. On and on, until the piles were leaning into each other. She put her things away and stacked Cole’s piles back into the laundry basket.

Grabbing her laptop she typed into the search engine _best dog breeds for kids_. There were lots of articles and she clicked on one that didn’t seem linked to a specific breeder. The entries weren’t wholly surprising. Retrievers were at the top of the list, and she couldn’t help but be taken in by the stock photos. The goldens always seemed to be smiling. She read the traits of many different breeds, looking for their caveats. Most of it seemed to come down to shedding.

She opened her calendar to see what she had on for the next day, but it was still open to her calendar for today. _Dr. Dayne._

It was such a strange assignment. _Do something for yourself each day_. Even stranger was Dr. Dayne’s response to her.

Most people looking at her would think she spent no shortage of time on herself. She had a standing manicure appointment each week and got her hair cut the fourth Tuesday of every month. Though she wore her fair share of yoga pants, she had plenty of beautiful pieces in her closet.

Sure, most of them had been sent to her by her mother and her sister-in-law, but nobody else had to know that.

To all the world she looked like a creature of vanity.

_Does this count?_

_No, you came here for Shireen, remember?_

Myrcella blushed even now. It was like her therapist’s peculiar, violet eyes had seen right down into her soul. As though she knew it was easier, to keep those appointments rather than let herself slip.

If she didn’t slip, if her appearance stayed just so, if her smile reached her eyes, no one – save a few pesky holdouts – asked any questions.

Even still, she tried not to imagine what Dr. Dayne’s response would be if she told her that.

Instead she thought about what she could do. No matter how silly of a request it was, the part of her mind that had obsessively gotten straight As and sat in the first row of all her classes made her unable to disregard the assignment completely.

She could have a glass of wine, but she’d never really liked drinking alone. She could call Margaery, but with the time difference it wasn’t a great time for her sister-in-law. She didn’t want to talk about her therapy appointment so she didn’t want to call Shireen. Or she could watch a movie. As she yawned she realized she’d probably have to keep it to a tv show.

Nothing really jumped out at her though so she thought about what else she could do within the confines of her own home. She considered _that_ but wasn’t really in the mood, and then she smiled, knowing exactly what she could do.

She went into her bathroom and turned the water on until it was nice and hot and the plugged the drain. She went underneath her sink and pulled out the jasmine bath bomb she’d picked up the last time she’d been in the luxury skincare store she liked.

The tub was filling up slowly and she smelled the ball she was holding, feeling more relaxed already.

And just like that, a scream erupted from the other room.

She dropped the ball and turned off the water and then ran into Cole’s room.

“Baby, baby, baby, you’re okay,” she promised.

“Mommy,” he cried.

“Shh, shhh, shhh, you’re okay,” she hugged her to him, rocking him back and forth.

He was gasping for breath, his little body working overtime and she pulled him to her chest, though she knew her heart wouldn’t do very much to steady his at the moment.

“Can…you…stay…with… me?” he asked.

Logically, she knew that she should say, no. At a certain point they’d have to curb it. It didn’t happen very often, but she couldn’t help but be worried that she was going to stunt his development or something.

Even still, her shaking child trumped any other concerns and she laid herself down, letting him burrow into her.

She started to sing his favorite lullaby, which wasn’t really a lullaby at all but had become one for them both, and halfway through his breathing steadied and by the end he was asleep.

Even still, she stayed where she was, settling against the pillows. She didn’t need a little something for herself, she had her big something. Her biggest, most important, can’t-live-without something, and that was enough for today to allow her to fall into a deep sleep without regrets.

*

The morning passed like any other. She woke up early and did an at-home pilates class, showered and readied herself before waking Cole. He made his breakfast request (eggs and fruit) and his snack request (cheddar bunny crackers) and then they got him dressed.

The only difference was that it was an unusually bright day, and her and Cole’s mood reflected it. They sang their oldies on the way to school and she didn’t regret it when she realized she’d forgotten her coat yet again.

He all but dragged her up to his classroom and she waved to a couple of friendly faces.

“Mr. Tarly it’s SUNNY!” Cole informed his teacher as soon as he spotted him.

“Isn’t it _delightful_?” Mr. Tarly agreed.

“De- _light_ -ful!” Cole giggled, “I get it.”

With that he ran over to his cubby and Mr. Tarly confessed to her, “I didn’t get it until he said it.”

She couldn’t help but laugh, “Your secret is safe with me.”

He smiled kindly at her, thanking her before turning to another child to greet them. She was waiting for Cole to come back so that she could make sure he remembered his folder, when she saw a familiar adorable face step into the room.

“Good morning Wes,” she smiled.

He smiled back at her, “Hi Meer..Mur…”

“Why don’t you just call me Ella?” she suggested. “My name is kind of a mouthful, huh?”

He grinned and nodded, “Ella’s pretty! My cousin Lya told me I should always tell a girl her name is pretty, but it actually is.”

She covered her mouth to hide her laugh, “Thank you, Wes.”

His Dad had walked in right behind him and she waved to him and he waved back.

“Did you see that yorange sun today?” she asked.

“Yeah it’s _sooo_ bright, Daddy let me where his sunglasses,” Wes informed her before running to his cubby and to greet Cole.

“He stole them, actually,” Robb informed her.

“Oh,” she nodded as solemnly as she was able, “I guess crime is finally on the rise in Riverrun…”

He smiled, which was polite because it was a pretty lame joke. He was one of the only Dads who did morning drop-off, and wore a tailored suit that suggested an important job. Or vanity, though she kind of doubted it.

“So Gilly mentioned your suggestion…,” he said.

“Yes,” she nodded, “Are you open to it?”

He started to nod but the boys were running back to them, “Can I walk you out?”

She nodded and then turned back to Cole and knelt down, “So you’ve got your folder.”

“Yes,” Cole agreed proudly.

“Aaaaand your sneakers,” she noted.

“Yes,” Cole giggled, knowing what was coming.

“What am I forgetting?” she asked.

His voice was nothing more than a laugh when he answered, “ _Kisses_.”

“Oh right! Thank you for reminding me,” she agreed and then smothered his face in kisses and he held her cheeks in his little hands. “Be good for Mr. Tarly alright, no talking while he does.” She turned to Wes who was hugging Robb goodbye, “You’ll keep him in line, won’t you?”

Wes nodded, as though it was a sworn vow and she couldn’t help but smile at his earnestness.

She and Robb said their goodbyes and then walked out of the room.

“Mr. Tarly is great, huh?” she asked.

“Yeah, Wes loves him,” Robb agreed. “Does Cole?”

She nodded, “Huge fan of the Tarl-man.”

Robb smirked and then opened the door for her as they got to the exit of the school. It really was a beautiful day and she lifted her face to the sun, wondering if a long walk could be her _little something._

She looked over at Robb and said, “If you’re not comfortable, it’s totally fine. I just wanted to suggest it because the boys get on so well.”

He shook his head, “No, I’m really grateful you did. Cole is the first kid Wes seems to have connected with and… well I think it’s great, really. I just wanted to talk to you because I know you mentioned to Gilly that she could come if it would make me feel more comfortable and… I would like that. I just… wanted you to know that it wasn’t because of _you_.”

She smiled at him, feeling relieved because she always wanted to go on the first playdate.

“I get it, really,” she promised, “It’s a new setting for Wes, and going from common ground like school is different to being at someone’s house. Not that… Cole takes his hosting duties _very_ seriously.”

Robb chuckled, “I’m sure he does. I’m sure you both do.” He turned more serious and said, “But yeah I think, just for the first time to see how he does.”

“That sounds great, plus it’ll let me pick Gilly’s brain so that I know his dos and don’ts,” she realized.

Robb looked at her and she blushed. She was unsure if that had been a weird thing to say but even if it wasn’t, it was a little hard not to blush under his gaze.

“I…” he started and then shook his head, “Thank you, Myrcella. Or do you prefer Ella?”

“Well now that I know that Ella is pretty,” she joked.

Robb smiled, “His cousin Lya has taught him well, just like her mother taught me. So I’ll just say they both are.” 

“Then either is fine,” she agreed. “Should I set up the details with Gilly this afternoon?”

He nodded, “That sounds good but here,” he said and then reached in his pocket and handed her a card, “In case of calamity. Or just…in case.”

She placed his card in her bag without looking at it, not wanting to be rude.

“I don’t have a card,” she informed him, “But I’ll give my number to Gilly so that you both have it… does he have any allergies?”

“Just one, apples,” Robb noted, “What a weirdo, huh?”

It was refreshing, compared to the helicopter mommies and the _my-babys_. _Oh no, my-baby would never do that. I wouldn’t believe it even if I witnessed it with my own eyes._

“Oh and only if he eats them,” he noted, “So don’t like, toss yours out the window or anything.”

“A narrow save,” she agreed, then tapped her bag, “Good thing I have your card. For calamities such as that.”

This time his smile didn’t seem polite, it was wide and preceded a chuckle that strangely made her think of fresh, cold air and snow.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I'd love to know what you all think!


	3. Chapter 3

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> I'm not sure why these chapters keep being so long, but alas, here we are...
> 
> This one starts from Myrcella's perspective. I'll likely be switching off depending on which POV makes sense to start with, but I imagine all chapters will have both of theirs.

“Should we use the same caterer we used last year?” Mrs. Piper asked.

“They were rather boring,” Lizzie Grey reminded her.

“And expensive,” Myrcella pointed out.

A few of the women turned to look at her, as though to wonder whether they really needed to have that discussion again. She was a bit of a broken record, admittedly, always trying to find a way to cut corners to make the event less expensive so that more could actually go to the research that was so badly needed.

She, for one, would be happy to have the discussion again if they’d like to.

“Though not astronomical,” Julie Chambers noted softly.

“And _reliable_ ,” Mrs. Piper added firmly. “Were any of you at that… save the… sting ray I think it was benefit? The caterer was _late_ and they pumped us all so full of liquor there were people _fornicating_ in the _bushes_.”

“I knew I should have gone,” Rebecca Harlton responded earnestly and Myrcella bit her lip to hide her laugh.

Rebecca was new to the group, having recently married Arwood Harlton. It was the sort of marriage she’d been seeing more and more recently, between older men of great means and younger women of great beauty. Women of her age, nearing thirty, were suddenly being passed over by men of their generation and so set their eyes on a different kind.

At least Rebecca and Arwood were the sort that you always wanted to put on a guest list for this sort of thing. She brought her personality and he his checkbook.

Rebecca winked at her and then suggested, “Actually a friend of mine just got married and the food was delicious. It was a smaller party but –“

“Well we _really_ wouldn’t want to work with amateurs,” Mrs. Piper shuddered.

“They were quite professional,” Rebecca assured her, though there was an edge to her voice.

Mrs. Piper pursed her lips and Julie glanced between them nervously. She was a peacekeeper, having taken this on when her mother was no longer able and still didn’t feel as though she had a seat enough at the table to dig her heels in anywhere.

“Thank you, Rebecca,” Myrcella smiled at her, “Would you be able to email me their name? I’ll do a little bit of research. Because I think we can all agree that delicious food, at a better price, _and_ the opportunity to support an up-and-coming local business is too good of a combination to pass up. Can’t we?”

They all murmured their assent and Myrcella moved down to the next action point. Once they’d made it through her list, and then assigned tasks to each person and she’d made note of them so that she could email them reminders later in the week, she smiled her goodbyes.

She glanced at her wristwatch and realized she wouldn’t have time to go home and change before picking the boys up from school. Though there were plenty of mothers who floated in wearing designer this or that, she didn’t like to. She especially didn’t like the idea of it when she was welcoming Gilly into her home. The dress and the heels and the diamonds in her ears were all a little Tracy Lord and Wes’ nanny seemed so sweet and down to earth.

There was nothing to be done about it though, because it was better to be overdressed than late, so she drove straight to the school.

She arrived a couple of minutes early so she checked her phone. She had missed a call from her mother and a few texts. She opened the one from Gendry first.

_Gendry: Hey I have to come back there in late October for work. They’ll put me up in a hotel, unless…_

She responded immediately: _You’re so full of it, and we’d love to have you. Let me know when it is one hundred percent confirmed and then I’ll tell Cole. Or you can call and tell him yourself._

If he wasn’t coming until late in October she would have to wait until mid-October to tell Cole. Otherwise every morning would start with _When is Uncle Gendry coming?_

Of all his uncles, Gendry was his favorite. Joffrey and Quentyn didn’t put up much of a fight, the former being entirely absent from their lives and the latter being nearly that. Tommy was his only rival, and Cole adored him, but Gendry was the fun uncle. The one who turned a boring old Tuesday night dinner into a celebration, who gave him too much cotton candy and let him stay up late.

His Aunts would have been harder to choose between. Likely at the tender age of five, if asked he would choose whichever one he’d seen or spoken to last. Arianne, Shireen, and Margaery were all wonderful in their own ways, and though they only saw each of them a few times year they all worked hard to stay on Cole’s mind.

He and Arianne were pen pals, and Myrcella used to read her letters to him and then write the ones he wanted to return to her. Since he’d started learning to read over the summer, Auntie Arianne’s letters were his favorite thing to practice with.

Shireen video called them twice a week and played silly games with Cole. They had a standing bit where they would pretend to try to turn one another into certain things ( _a unicorn, but my mane is made out of dandelions and my horn is an ice cream cone!)_ only for it to go horribly wrong ( _okay okay okay, so you do have a horn made out of an ice cream cone **but** I think I turned you into blue corn by accident…)_.

And Margaery was just Margaery. Clever and kind with just enough mischief behind her eyes.

She talked about them all constantly, even Quentyn who had sent them a stack of postcards over the years, though not Joffrey, because she didn’t want Cole to feel distant from his family. Even though, in proximity, he was.

Myrcella tossed her phone back in her bag and got out of the car, a bounce in her step. Cole wasn’t the only one who would look forward to a visit from Gendry. She wasn’t sure if she missed him the most because he was her favorite too, or because he was the worst at communication, but she never screened his calls the ways she’d occasionally let ones from the others go to voicemail if she was busy or exhausted or in a funk.

She walked into the school, waving to a few other parents and headed towards Cole’s classroom. The door was open so she walked inside, used to the chaos she found there.

“Mommmmmmy!” Cole called, running over to her.

“Hi baby,” she hugged him, leaning down and kissing his soft curls. “Do you have all your things?”

He nodded happily and then called, “Wesssss.”

“COMING!” Wes called and Gilly turned and waved to her.

Myrcella waved back, smiling at her. As expected Gilly was wearing jeans and a cute white and blue striped turtleneck shirt, her brown hair pulled up in a ponytail. She and Cole waited for them.

“Hi Wes, hi Gilly,” she greeted them, “We’re so excited for you to come over.”

“Us too,” Gilly agreed with a smile as Cole and Wes started playing some sort of hand game.

“Do you want to follow me over?” she asked.

Gilly smiled, “I think that could be a _nightmare_ in this parking lot, but I have the address plugged into my GPS.”

That was true, depending on where they were parked, there was absolutely no way of finding each other in the madness of afternoon pick-up so they walked outside together and went to their respective cars. She got Cole buckled into his car seat and he told her all about his day, but his words were all running together in his excitement.

Their schedule had already been full last week and the past weekend, so they’d had to wait until nearly a week after she’d first suggested it to actually get the playdate set up. Cole had other friends in class with whom she had already arranged playdates with, and though Cole gladly would have cancelled them, she refused to.

She didn’t like to refuse him very often, but it was important that he understood commitments, she didn’t want him to be the sort of boy who went whichever way the wind blew.

He’d hardly been able to sleep the night before and they’d pulled out all different sorts of toys and games that he and Wes could play. She was a little nervous his exuberance would overwhelm the more subdued Wes, but they seemed to balance each other out – Cole drew out Wes’ more excitable nature and Wes steadied his.

Gilly must have parked further away from the school because when Myrcella pulled into their circular drive, she saw Gilly’s car, a compact navy blue hybrid, already there.

She parked and walked around to unclip a wiggling Cole out of his seat. He hopped out of the car and raced over to Wes.

“Want to go upstairs and play trains? Ohh or we could jump on the trampoline! Oh or we could play dragon riders oh or-“

“Cole,” she laughed, “Let’s let everyone get inside.”

Gilly was smiling too and she lead them up the front steps and unlocked the door, turning off the alarm as they got inside.

“Can I show Wes my room, Mommy?” Cole asked.

Myrcella glanced at Gilly who nodded so Myrcella said, “Of course. You boys go upstairs and I’ll sort out a snack with Gilly.”

Cole grabbed Wes hand and the boys trotted up the staircase, speaking in a language she didn’t understand. She gestured towards the kitchen so Gilly followed her in.

“Wow,” Gilly said, “This is my _dream_ kitchen.”

Myrcella smiled as she looked around the space, “Thank you, I spend so much time in here I wanted to love it. Do you like to cook?”

Gilly nodded, “I love to. My kitchen in my apartment is _tiny_ but Robb’s is amazing and woefully underused when I’m not there. He can cook but…”

Gilly trailed off, tilting her hand back and forth as though to suggest the results were spotty and Myrcella smiled. Most of Cole’s friends’ nannies were on their best behavior around her, thinking she would rat them out to their employers.

“Can I get you something to drink? I have some iced tea made, or seltzer, juice, water?” Myrcella asked.

“Iced tea sounds lovely, thank you,” Gilly agreed.

Myrcella grabbed two glasses and plopped some ice in each and then poured them each servings and handed Gilly’s hers.

She took a small sip and then opened the fridge back up, looking to see what she could make for the boys.

“Is it alright to give them a snack?” Myrcella asked, “I have cookies I made yesterday but I can do something healthier… I’m not sure what Robb’s rules are about sugar.”

“Eat it before he does,” Gilly noted and Myrcella was so surprised that she burst out laughing. She turned around and Gilly explained, “He’s got a bit of a sweet tooth. We hide things from him.”

She’d had an inkling before, but in that moment she knew that she liked Gilly. Really liked her.

“And Wes too?” she wondered, “Cole is more into savory like his- it drives me crazy.”

Gilly agreed smoothly, “Yeah Wes is cut from the same cloth but um… sorry do you mind if I check his lunch box?”

“Of course,” Myrcella waved her off, trying to keep the confusion from her face.

Gilly took Wes’ lunch box out and opened it, her brow furrowing briefly.

“Maybe something healthy before a cookie?” she suggested.

“Will he eat hummus?” Myrcella asked.

“Let’s see,” Gilly smiled.

Myrcella pulled out some carrots and celery, cutting them into smaller chunks and then pulled out a container of hummus she’d made over the weekend.

“Is iced tea okay for him? There’s no caffeine,” she noted. Gilly nodded so Myrcella walked to the back stairs, “BOYS! Come have a snack!”

She heard a stampede of little feet barreling through the hallway and then clomping down the stairs.

“YOU HAVE TO SEE THE STARS IN COLE’S ROOM,” Wes informed Gilly.

Gilly held her hands up, as though he was catching her off guard though it was unlikely, “I WAS FRAMED.”

Myrcella smiled as Wes and Cole giggled, though she was sure they didn’t understand what she’d said. She brought the vegetables and hummus over to the table.

“What do you boys want to drink? Water? Milk? Juice? Iced Tea?” she asked.

“Iced tea,” Cole answered and Wes agreed.

She got them both plastic cups and filled them halfway and brought them over to the table. The boys piled in and Cole picked up a carrot and scooped a troubling amount of hummus onto it.

“What’s that?” Wes asked.

“Hsdfamus,” Cole answered as he chewed.

They were working on his table manners, but it was the one place where he was a slow learner.

“It’s hummus,” she explained, “But if you don’t like it I can get you some peanut butter.”

Wes opened his mouth but Gilly cut him off, “ _After_ you try it.”

Wes picked up a carrot and dipped it in, taking about a tenth of the portion Cole had and took a small, tentative bite. He chewed it thoughtfully and then went to go dip his carrot back in. Myrcella was relieved but Gilly was not.

“Nope nope, no double dipping, remember?” Gilly asked, then looked at her, “Sorry we are still learning our manners.”

“That’s alright,” Myrcella laughed, her hands tilting Cole’s face up to her, “So are we, aren’t we?”

“Yefjsdf Mosdjfammy,” Cole illustrated her point.

She kissed his forehead and went over and grabbed out two little plates and a spoon, and then put portions of the hummus on each.

When the boys had finished they headed out to the backyard to play. It was a beautiful afternoon and she always wanted Cole to get outside as much as possible when it was like this, considering how damp it could be most of the time. Not that he minded the weather here, he loved to splash in puddles.

“Can I help you?” Gilly asked as she brought their cups to the sink.

“That’s alright, but thank you,” Myrcella answered, wondering the last time she’d been asked that. “But you could tell me about yourself…”

“Oh, well, there’s not much to know, I’m quite boring,” Gilly answered.

Almost identically to how Myrcella had described herself to Dr. Dayne.

So Myrcella replied, “I doubt that,” just as her therapist had.

“Well,” Gilly said, “I’ve been working for Robb for two years, I’m originally from up north, further than from where he’s from and I came down here to… well it was time for a change. I sort of bounced between odd jobs until I answered a post for a nanny job. I had never done it but I have younger sisters so… and anyway it turned out to be so lucky because Robb and Wes are wonderful.”

Myrcella rinsed the boys’ plates and said, “Wes seems to adore you.”

Gilly smiled, “He’s a lovely boy. And Robb is so great…”

Myrcella turned to look at her and offered gently, “You know I’m not reporting back to him, right?”

Gilly laughed, “I mean it. And trust me, I’m not scared of Robb.”

Myrcella smiled, glancing out the window to see the boys playing tag, though a special dragon sort of tag, flapping their wings. Happy as can be.

“Good,” then suggested, “Because I think we’ll likely be seeing a lot of each other. So I’d like you to feel… comfortable with me.”

Gilly blushed and Myrcella winced, realizing that she’d just said the exact wrong thing, but Gilly told her, “That’s kind of you. I’ll admit you’re a little intimidating.”

With that she glanced up and down her and Myrcella blushed. She’d forgotten she was still dressed from her meeting and looked down at herself.

“I promise that wasn’t my intention, I had this meeting with this committee I’m on and if you aren’t dressed just _so_ everyone spends more time judging you than they do on planning,” she explained and then said the oft-used excuse, hoping the sarcasm would be clear in her voice, “But it’s for a good cause.”

Gilly smiled, “You look beautiful. But yes, a _little_ intimidating.”

Myrcella looked at her, “Could I run upstairs and get changed?”

Gilly looked horrified, “Please don’t do it on my account!”

“No, no,” Myrcella smiled, “I just am _so_ uncomfortable in these heels and I’d love to get outside and enjoy this day.”

Gilly relaxed and nodded, “Of course, I’ll watch the boys. Take your time.”

Myrcella hoped she didn’t think that was why she’d invited her to come over as well, but merely promised to be quick and then went up the back stairs. She pulled off her dress and stepped out of her heels, taking the diamonds out of her ears. She went into closet and pulled out a pair of relaxed fit jeans and a cozy old sweater and then pulled on socks and sneakers and headed back downstairs, pulling her hair into a low bun as she did.

“So much better!” she exulted.

“Oh okay, not even _vaguely_ terrifying now,” Gilly nodded, “So I’m just going to tell you every terrible thing about Robb and Wes.”

Myrcella grinned, resting her elbows on the kitchen counter and leaning forward, “Hit me with those gory details.”

“Well,” Gilly leaned forward conspiratorially, “Sometimes…”

Myrcella narrowed her eyes, “Pathetic. You can’t think of a single thing, can you?”

Gilly giggled, “No. I can’t. Isn’t that awful?”

Myrcella shook her head, “No, it’s really nice… _Intimidating_ but nice. Maybe I should be worried about _you_ reporting back about _us_.”

“Yes well,” Gilly said, knocking her sunglasses off of her head so that they landed perfectly on her nose, “Give me that hummus recipe and I’ll say anything you want.”

Myrcella threw her head back and laughed, confirming it was a good deal. They went out the back door into the backyard and stepped into the sunshine.

They each sat down in a wrought iron chair, watching from a safe distance as the boys chased each other this way and that. She didn’t press Gilly for more information about herself, but it came out slowly, organically, as they traded recipes and book recommendations back and forth.

And the next day when Dr. Dayne asked her what her favorite thing she’d done for herself that week had been, it didn’t take her long to think about it.

***

“ _Lya Mommy is talking right now, can you go wash your hands for supper?_ ” Sansa asked her daughter before turning her attention back to him, “Sorry Robb, what were you saying?”

“I was wondering when you guys thought you might get down here next,” he repeated into the phone as he pulled off the main road and then down a side one.

“Maybe early October?” Sansa noted, “Lya doesn’t have soccer the weekend of October 8th, because it’s a long weekend… maybe we could come then?”

“That’d be great,” Robb agreed. “Let me know when it’s 100% confirmed and I’ll tell Wes.”

“Of course, how’s he doing?” Sansa asked.

“He’s doing great,” Robb noted and then amended, “Well I hope so. He had his first playdate today, so I’m hoping that went well.”

“That’s so great! Who is it with?” his sister asked, the excitement clear in her voice.

He’d shared his fears with Sansa about Wes and she’d been sympathetic and reassuring, but there was nothing she could say that would make him feel better. Particularly not when she had to keep a special calendar for her daughter Lya’s playdates to make sure they didn’t double book.

“This boy from his class, Cole,” Robb told her, “Seems like a sweet kid. Really outgoing.”

“What is his family like, does he have siblings? Are his parents nice?” she asked.

_That sounds great, plus it’ll let me pick Gilly’s brain about his do’s and don’ts._

He wasn’t entirely sure why that comment had floored him so much. It just felt like an investment, like she was preparing for more playdates and wanted to do anything she could to ensure that her home was a nice, safe place for his son to go.

Wes wasn’t short of people who loved him or who’d look out for him, but other than Gilly and him, he spent most of his time with Uncle Bryden and Theon. They both would lay down in front of a train for his son but weren’t necessarily stocking their fridge with his favorite things.

“I don’t know if he has siblings, actually,” Robb answered, “And I’ve only met his Mom.”

“What’s she like?” Sansa asked casually.

“She seems nice,” he answered.

“What is it?” Sansa asked, much less casually.

“What?” he wondered.

“I don’t know, just something in your voice. Seemed like you weren’t quite sure or…” Sansa mused and when he didn’t answer, “But I must have been imagining it.”

Robb pulled off the street and drove down his driveway, “I’m just pulling in, can I call you over the weekend?”

“Text me to let me know how it went,” Sansa agreed, “Love you.”

He said his goodbyes and then hung up the phone, parking his car. He’d hardly made it out when Wes came running out to him.

“DADADADADADDYYY,” Wes yelled.

“WEWEWEWESSSYY,” Robb returned bending forward so that his son could launch himself into his arms.

He kicked his door shut and kissed Wes’ forehead and cheeks and then again, and then again until Wes was giggling.

“Did you have a good day?” he asked as calmly as possible.

“THE BEST EVER!” Wes agreed.

He wasn’t sure how, but one way or another he was going to find a way to repay Cole Martell. It wasn’t that he felt like Wes was getting the better end of the deal, Wes was the best company around, but even still Cole had a lot riding on his little shoulders. Wes’ first playdate, the one that would set the tone for all the others. If it had gone wrong Robb had been afraid that it would set him back even further.

“I can’t wait to hear all about it,” Robb told him honestly, petting Grey Wind who had come out to greet him as well.

He walked them all into the house and closed the door, ignoring the mail that Gilly had left for him on the side table.

She was standing at the stove and he could smell some sort of stir fry that made his mouth water.

“And how was _your_ playdate?” he asked her.

She turned with a grin, “It was wonderful.”

“Yeah?” he asked.

She nodded happily and he brought Wes to the sink so that they could both wash their hands for dinner.

“Are you staying?” he asked.

“Not tonight,” Gilly shook her head, avoiding meeting his eyes.

“Wes, can you feed Grey Wind tonight?” he asked.

“Yeah Daddy,” Wes said as he let him down and he ran to grab Grey Wind’s bowl.

“Thanks honey, I’m just going to walk Gilly to her car,” he told him.

Gilly turned off the stove and grabbed her things, “See you tomorrow, Wes.”

“Love you,” Wes called absently as he leveled off the scoop of dog food with an intense look on his face.

“Love you too,” Gilly smiled and started walking down the hall.

Robb followed her out into the drive, “All okay? Did he really have a good time?”

Gilly’s face looked relieved, “Oh, yes of course! Really Robb it… couldn’t have gone better. He and Cole had such a great time, he’ll tell you all about it.”

“And Ella didn’t… leave you to watch them right?” he asked.

Admittedly, he would be surprised if he had. They’d seen each other at morning drop-off and tended to talk more mornings than not. She seemed like a very involved parent, and didn’t seem to have a nanny of her own, but he still wanted to make sure.

“She let me watch them for all of 45 seconds while she changed,” Gilly noted drily, “The rest of the time I felt like I was at a fancy spa.”

He chuckled, “Thinking of switching families, hmmm?”

Gilly pretended to consider it but then smiled, “But no really. She’s not like that. Ask Wes to tell you about her Maximus impression.”

“Maximus?” Robb asked, trying to place the name and then he looked at her, “Like the horse in Tangled?”

Gilly nodded, “It’s uncanny.”

He smirked, “Alright, will do. So, what was it then?”

“You’re so annoying,” she informed him, “You know I’m terrible at lying.”

“Even by omission,” he noted, “Spill.”

She rolled her eyes, “I have a date. Okay? And I’m not telling you who it is with so don’t even bother.”

He narrowed his eyes at her and she looked back at him stubbornly, “Fine. Just be careful, and call if you need anything.” She nodded and he patted her shoulder, thanking her and then went to walk inside. He turned back though and said, “Oh and Gilly? Have fun.”

She took a deep breath and nodded, “I’ll try.”

“You okay to drive?” he asked.

She nodded, “Promise. Oh and if he doesn’t like the stir fry there is some leftover meatloaf in tinfoil in the fridge.”

He thanked her again and walked back inside, finding Wes waiting for him and Grey Wind looking at him as though wondering whether he could pretend that he hadn’t eaten yet.

They settled in at the table and Robb served Wes a small portion to start out with in case, as Gilly noted as a possibility, he didn’t like it.

After cutting up Wes’ chicken he pushed his plate back to him and pleaded, “So tell me about your day. What did you and Cole do?”

“We played dragon-tag and jumped on his trampoline and played trains and I ate wummass,” Wes told him.

It was a lot to unpack but he asked, “Wummass?”

Wes looked at him and nodded, “I think that’s what it’s called. I ate it with carrots.”

“Wummass,” Robb repeated, consulting his inner translator. “Hummus?”

“Yeah,” Wes nodded, as though that’s what he’d said. “Gilly’s gonna make it.”

“I can buy some at the store if you like it that much,” he noted.

Wes shook his head, “Ella _made_ it. Oh and cookies! They were so good.”

“What kind of cookies?” Robb asked curiously, feeling stomach envy.

“Ginger molasses,” Wes enunciated every syllable carefully as though he’d memorized it.

Robb fought the urge to moan, ignoring that and asked him more questions. Wes confirmed that Ella’s Maximus impression was _sososofunny_ and told him all about school and then half a dozen other great things he’d done with Cole.

He texted Sansa after dinner saying _Huge success_ and then cleaned up while he let Wes watch an episode of Dragon Riders.

They went through their usual nightly routine and Robb waited for him to ask to watch Mommy but his eyelids were drooping so much that he couldn’t even make it through the second book.

Robb carried him to his room and laid him down, pulling the covers up to his chin. Grey Wind came and hopped up, settling down next to him.

“Sleep tight, honey,” he kissed the top of Wes’ head.

“Daddy?” he asked.

“Yeah?” he wondered, feeling hope in his stomach.

“Can we get stars for my ceiling? Like Cole’s?” Wes asked.

“Sure,” Robb agreed, “They’re pretty cool, huh?”

Wes hugged Grey Wind to him, yawning, “His Daddy lives on a star.”

Robb looked at him, he was going to ask something, anything, but Wes was already asleep. He stroked his hair and turned out the light, leaving the door slightly ajar and walking towards his bedroom.

His stomach churned with something. Grief, maybe, but not surprise.

He had known, deep down, that Cole’s father had died. Not in any conscious part of his mind, but there had just been a feeling. Ella hadn’t mentioned it any of the times they’d spoken, and he knew it had been possible that she was divorced or that Cole’s Dad just wasn’t in the picture, but he’d known that wasn’t the case.

Now, even more so, he was determined to do something for Cole. He seemed like a happy kid, almost like he had a gift for happiness, but still. Though Wes hadn’t even been two when Jeyne passed, he still felt her absence. He was sure that Cole felt his father’s too, as evidenced by the stars on his bedroom ceiling.

Robb smiled, pulling out his laptop as he got an idea for what he could do. He checked into it and then contented with the plan he opened his email and saw what he’d missed.

Thankfully it was a pretty light night and he closed his laptop an hour later and turned on the tv. He watched a few minutes of the news and then turned on a terrible movie that he could fall asleep to.

*

The morning passed like any other. He woke, dressed, woke Grey Wind, fed Grey Wind, worked out, drank coffee, answered emails, shower, dressed, answered more emails, woke Wes, fed Wes, dressed Wes. The routine centered him, both of them really, to start their days.

There was no argument about rainboots because it was a torrential downpour and they both pulled theirs on and their rain coats, and he carried him out to the car under an umbrella.

They didn’t turn on the radio, he just focused on driving, taking it slowly, not caring if either of them were late.

He pulled into the parking lot at the usual time though and they made a run for it into the school. Only about half of Wes’ class was there so far, and he was sure they’d be trickling in all morning the way kids did up North when they got a blizzard.

He got Wes out of his boots and rain coat and helped him tie his shoes. The coat room was already slippery and he looked around for Mr. Tarly to tell him, not wanting anyone to wipe out.

His eyes caught on Cole and Ella as they came into the room, Cole nearly doing a hockey stop as he slid in.

“Can we go say hi?” Wes asked.

“Of course,” Robb agreed and Wes pulled him over.

“Coooooooole!” Wes said excitedly.

“WES!” Cole grinned, “I swam here.”

“Cool!” Wes agreed.

“Hey,” he greeted Ella.

“Morning Robb,” she greeted him as always and then focused on his son, “Wes, my sweetheart, pretty pretty please tell me you’ve been working on it.”

Wes released his hand and then made held his arms up as though he was going to karate chop, “I geeve herr a HA and aaaaa WA and a hooooooooooowa and I keek her sir.”

“Groundbreaking, incredible,” Ella clapped, as he laughed, “Truly perfect.”

Robb had no idea what he was doing but it was undeniably adorable. He wished that he had something to say to Cole other than _morning_ but he didn’t know him yet.

“Can I walk you out?” he asked her, hoping to change that.

“Sure,” she agreed, “I just need to get him settled. Do you have another minute?”

“Take your time,” he agreed and then let Wes pull him over to show him the map of the world.

Wes showed him where they were and then asked him to show him where Winterfell was and where Auntie Arya was, his eyes growing wide at how far away everyone was.

“Robb guess what!” someone said beside them and to his surprise it was Cole.

“What’s up, buddy?” he asked, crouching down.

“My _tooth_ is _loose_ ,” Cole grinned and then wiggled his front tooth.

“Oh Cole,” Ella shuddered, “You know that freaks me out.”

Cole gave him a toothy grin and Robb couldn’t help but smile back. He held his hand to the side of Cole’s face, blocking Ella’s view of him and said, “Let’s see it again.”

Cole wiggled it proudly, his pale eyes lighting up with excitement.

“Pretty cool,” he agreed, though internally he was freaking out that Wes was old enough to be losing teeth. “You’re gonna be a soup eater soon.”

The boys looked at him like he was crazy but Ella laughed, “That’s what my father called me when I lost my teeth.”

“Mine too,” Robb agreed. “Should we…”

She nodded and they hugged their sons goodbye, waving at Mr. Tarly and some of the other parents.

Unlike other days, even she was wearing a raincoat today, though he didn’t see an umbrella. Though she was always perfectly together, intimidatingly so according to Gilly, she seemed to constantly forget protective gear for herself. Though, never he’d noted, for Cole.

Even in their rain coats he didn’t want to talk outside so they stood to the side of the main entrance.

“Thanks for yesterday,” he opened.

“We had _such_ a nice time,” she told him, then glanced around before saying, “Don’t tell anyone, but Wes is the sweetest of Cole’s friends.”

“That’s really good to hear,” he told her genuinely.

It was possible she said that to all the parents but he sort of doubted it. Both because she didn’t seem the type and also because Wes was incredibly sweet-natured.

“And Gilly is…,” Ella trailed off as though at a loss for words.

“I know,” he agreed. “She’s the best. So uh… I was hoping to ask two things… the first is, do you happen to remember where you got the stars on Cole’s ceiling? We’ve talked about them. A lot.”

Ella smiled and nodded, “Yeah I got them on this great website, they have all sorts of stuff like that. I can send it to you. They also have a projector thingy with these slides of space? Cole loves his, though… I’ll warn you. Nothing will prepare you for your baby explaining what a _nebula_ is.”

He chuckled, “That’d be great, here um…” he pulled out his wallet to grab his card.

“Oh I already have that,” she noted, “It was for calamities but, maybe we can make an exception.”

“We could,” he agreed, “But I think him not having those stars on his ceiling by this weekend would _count_ as a calamity in his book so…”

She laughed a sweet, warm laugh and then reminded him, “You had a second thing…”

“Right,” he agreed, “Well especially now that I know that he knows what a _nebula_ is… I was thinking I could take the boys to the planetarium at the science museum. Maybe this weekend? Has Cole been?”

She shook her head, “No, I keep meaning to take him but… we always end up at the Children’s Museum. I’m sure he’d love it.”

“Great, we have something Sunday afternoon so maybe Saturday?” he suggested.

She nodded, “Saturday’s perfect.”

Something about her seemed like maybe it wasn’t though so he asked, “Are you sure?”

“Yes, of course,” she agreed and then grimaced, “But… would you mind if I tagged along?”

“Oh, no,” he shook his head, “Of course not I should have asked I just… figured I’d give you some time to yourself as a thank you… but of course. You don’t know me all that-”

“It’s not that,” she interrupted gently, “It’s just that Cole has a tendency to wander and though I have no doubt you’d watch them carefully, you’d be playing zone defense.”

Something about her knowing what zone defense was struck him as very strange and he was sure his amusement showed on his face.

She added, “And it just… it seems like fun?”

He glanced around and then asked quietly, “Why are you saying that like it’s a bad thing?”

She blushed and stage-whispered, “I’m not sure.”

He laughed and nodded, “So Saturday then. We can pick you guys up at 10? I like to have Wes home for a nap around 2 on the weekends…”

“Cole too,” she agreed. “10 is great.”

They looked at each other and he was unsure how to detach himself now. It shouldn’t have been difficult, he had to go to work, but he didn’t want to be rude.

“Alright,” she relieved him and zipped up her jacket all the way until it covered her mouth and pulled up her hood, “I’m going to make a run for it. It will not be dignified.”

He smirked, and held up his umbrella, “Do you want me to walk you to your car?”

“No, no,” she held up her hand, “I’ll never learn my lesson that way.” She glanced warily out the door and then looked back at him, “You know I… I actually learned a lesson the other day.”

He chuckled, “You can’t overload your brain or you won’t retain any of it. Come on.”

She smiled gratefully and he pushed the door and opened the umbrella. They both laughed because it was woefully under equipped to deal with the rain and they were both soaked through by the time they reached her car.

“Thank you,” she said, unlocking it.

She’d stepped out from underneath his umbrella to do it and her hood blew off. Her hair was instantly soaked, locks of it stuck to her cheeks, making her look incredibly young.

He looked around at the water pooling on the ground and the rain coming down in grey sheets and found himself asking, “You okay to drive?”

Maybe his own was clear on his face or maybe she just felt it herself, but she looked at him in surprise.

“Yeah,” she nodded quickly and then something flashed in her eyes and she added more earnestly, “Promise.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Would looove to know what you think!


	4. Chapter 4

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Oh my gosh thank you all for reading and commenting! It really makes such a difference to know you're enjoying the story.
> 
> This chapter is mostly Robb POV but Myrcella is at the end too.

_“This isn’t fair,” he grumbled._

_Jeyne’s bedroom giggle reverberated against his chest as her silky brown hair tickled his neck, “So spoiled.”_

_“Give me a taste,” he pleaded, his arms wrapping around her, unbuttoning one of the buttons on the old shirt of his that only she wore anymore and slipping his hand to feel the smoothness underneath._

_“Of the cookies?” she asked, tilting her head back and whispering in his ear, “Or me?”_

_“Either,” he groaned, turning her around._

_He went to kiss her, but she stopped him, a rueful smile on her soft lips, “How about both?”_

_With that she dipped her finger in the bowl and proffered it, a small chunk of dough stuck to it. He took her small hand in his and raised it to his lips, watching as her eyes widened as he took it in his mouth, his tongue licking the dough off the tip of it and then lingering on her sweet skin._

_“Delicious,” he murmured against her palm._

_He pulled her body flush against his and kissed her lips. She kissed him back and then mmmed against him._

_“Those **are** good,” she grinned. _

_He chuckled against her lips, “I know, what are they?”_

_“Ginger molasses…”_

*

Robb woke just as a pair of intruders entered his room, all but on tiptoes. He shook himself out of the dream. It had been of Jeyne, which wasn’t entirely rare, though it had been happening less over the summer.

There had been something different about it though, something that made his stomach clench from its wrongness. It hadn’t been bad just wrong, somehow.

Sansa said that trying to remember dreams was like trying to catch the rain with her fingers, and he felt that now.

He didn’t have time to dwell on it though because a second later Wes was climbing into his bed, as was Grey Wind.

“WHO. DARES. DISTURB. MY. SLUMBER?” he asked in his ogre voice.

“ _Meeeeeee,”_ Wes informed him, pancaking on top of him.

“Oh, then that’s alright,” he grinned, pulling the comforter out from underneath Wes so that he could pull it over him.

Wes burrowed into his chest and he stroked his hair, as Grey Wind snuggled up against his feet. Robb looked over at the clock and was surprised to see it was 6:45. Wes rarely made it this late on weekends, though he had let him stay up a little late the night before.

“Did you sleep well?” he wondered.

“Yeah,” Wes yawned, “Can I sleepalittle more though?”

“Only if I can,” Robb noted and Wes nodded against his chest.

He rubbed his hand up and down Wes’ little back and closed his eyes, feeling Wes weight become more solid against him as his breathing steadied. Focusing on Wes’ back rising and falling helped him drift off too, and when he woke again it was 7:30.

He fed Grey Wind and then Wes, and because it was only overcast but not raining, he decided to get them all outside. Over the summer, with an inspiring, though somewhat precocious determination, Wes had decided that he was ready to not use training wheels anymore. There had been a lot of skinned knees and some tears, on both their parts, but he’d gotten the hang of it and was now steady as could be.

He got them both ready and they took off down the road, him running with Grey Wind and Wes biking beside them.

It was warm still, and they went down to the park that travelled along the river and set about on a path where they didn’t have to worry about cars.

“Race me Daddy!” Wes ordered.

“You sure you want to, hmm?” he called back.

“YESSS RACE ME!” Wes grinned.

“Alright, come on Grey Wind,” he urged and then pushed himself into a sprint.

He was holding Grey Wind back, even at eight his dog could run to the ends of the earth if he needed to, but they still made a good go of it. They had Wes at first, but as the path started going down Wes’ momentum carried him until he overtook them.

When Wes got about twenty feet ahead of him Robb called, “RED LIGHT.”

His son slowed to a stop and Robb released Grey Wind’s leash and their dog ran over to Wes while Robb jogged over.

“You’re getting too good on that thing,” Robb informed him. “Let me ride it for a bit.”

Wes giggled and got off his bike and handed it to him. Robb didn’t really have any desire to ride it, but he got on anyway. He and Gilly sometimes did that, to get Wes practiced at sharing, which as an only child wasn’t something that happened organically.

It was horribly uncomfortable, and his knees were basically at his shoulders, but he started riding slowly as Wes and Ghost walked beside him along the trail.

“Hmmm, am I too small for this?” he wondered.

“No- _o-_ O- _o_ -o,” Wes laughed.

When he really couldn’t take it anymore, he got off the bike and helped Wes get back on before they turned back towards the house.

They talked about all the things they were going to do at the museum in addition to the planetarium. There was the bubble room, which was always a favorite, and then a room where you pushed light back and forth like a ball, and tons of others.

To say that Wes was excited about spending the morning with Cole was an understatement. Gilly had told him of the difficulty she and Ella had parting them after school yesterday, and most dinners were devoted to discussing whatever he and Cole had done that day. Robb was also looking forward to finally spending some time with him.

He was a little surprised at how excited Wes was that Ella was coming, too.

It wasn’t as though he’d expected him to be upset about it or anything, but he really just hadn’t imagined he’d care either way. Robb couldn’t remember ever caring if his friends’ parents were around when he was younger.

The plan he’d imagined her having of making Wes comfortable seemed to have worked though, and he was grateful for it. If Cole and Wes were going to be in and out of each other’s houses, it was important.

Robb showered when he got back and made himself some eggs as Wes colored at the table, lazily eating a banana.

Ella had emailed him her address when she’d sent him the website for the lights the same day he’d requested it. She didn’t live too far from them, so they piled into the car at ten to ten and drove over.

She lived in a similar neighborhood to his own and he pulled down the driveway to find a large old home made of grey stone. It had dark green shutters and a white carport out in front. It had a quiet, proud look to it, that was immediately contradicted by Cole opening the door and running excitedly to the car.

He rolled down Wes window who was trying to jump out of his car seat to greet his friend.

Ella came out a moment later holding Cole’s and Robb got out of the car to help her with it.

“Morning!” she smiled, “Oh thank you.”

“Hey Cole,” Robb held his hand low and Cole slapped it with his own. “You excited?”

“OH YEAH,” Cole agreed.

“I can confirm he is excited,” Ella nodded and then whispered, “Has been since 5 am.”

“Oooof,” Robb grimaced.

She followed him over to the other side of the car and they got Cole’s seat secure and then he stepped away so that she could buckle him into it. Once he was sure she didn’t need help he got back into the driver’s seat and waited until she came around to the passenger’s seat.

“Ella guess WHAT,” Wes said before she even had a chance to buckle.

She turned around, “What’s up, buttercup?”

“There’s a WHOLE ROOM of bubbles,” Wes told her proudly.

“COOL,” Cole exulted.

“A whole room of bubbles?” Ella asked then turned to him and ordered dramatically, “DRIVE, FOR THE LOVE OF THE GODS MAN, WHAT ARE YOU WAITING FOR?”

“WOOOOOOOO,” Wes and Cole called from the back.

Ella looked back at them and grinned as she buckled her seat belt and he pulled away. He felt her gaze on him briefly, but he kept his eyes on the drive and then pulled them onto the street.

The museum was downtown so he headed south, driving by the kids’ school. Cole and Wes were chattering happily in some language he didn’t understand, and he slowed at the red light, sparing a glance at Ella.

She seemed content sitting there, saying nothing, listening to their sons. Her hands were folded in her lap, her spine perfectly straight. She turned and looked at him and so there was nothing to do but smile and she returned it with a small one of her own.

The light turned green and he continued down the road. As they neared the city center the traffic grew thicker and he wove in between cars slowly.

There was some ass in a sports car that edged into his lane before slipping in front of him and Robb’s arm went out in front of her as he slowed before retracting back to the wheel.

“Thanks,” she said.

“People drive like idiots,” he noted, gripping the wheel slightly.

“Yeah,” she agreed.

He wasn’t sure if she wanted to say something else, or make conversation, but he focused on the road and she didn’t broach anything further. It was only a couple more miles to the science museum and when he pulled in the parking lot he was relieved to see it mostly empty.

If it was rainy, the parking lot would already be full, but given that it was dry they’d hopefully have the run of the place.

“Alright,” he parked the car and turned to the boys, “Who is excited?

“Meeeee,” Cole and Wes answered.

He turned to look at Ella in horror and she agreed, “Pathetic.”

“My question was: WHO. IS. EXCITED?” he asked again.

“MEAFJJEEEEEEEEEEEE,” the boys shouted at them.

“There we go, that’s all we ask,” Ella slapped her leg.

They both got out of the car and Robb walked around the back of it to let Wes out of his car seat, which was behind Ella’s seat. He had figured she would go around front but they all but collided into each other.

“Sorry!” he winced.

“That’s okay,” she smiled and then gritted her teeth, her eyes closing, “We’re just REALLY EXCITED!”

He chuckled and walked around her and opened the door, pulling a wiggling Wes out of his seat as Ella let Cole out. The boys ran to each other and hugged in that unself-conscious way of children and took each other’s hands as he and Ella got on their either side to walk into the museum.

They decided to go to the light room first and the boys ran to one side, waving their arms up and down.

“Is something supposed to be happening?” Ella asked.

Robb looked at the wall and nodded, “Yeah I think they are too small for it, hold on.”

He ran over to them and picked up Wes, “Try again.”

Wes waved his hand and he heard Cole’s _ooooh_ as a ball of light on the wall went towards the other side.

“GET IT ELLA!” Wes called.

He turned and watched as Ella smacked it back so Wes did it again. Robb looked down at Cole who had a huge grin on his face in spite of the fact that he hadn’t been able to participate yet.

“Here honey, can we give Cole a turn?” he asked.

“YEAH! You have to try this,” Wes agreed.

“Do you want to?” Robb asked, not wanting to pick up a small child if he didn’t want to be.

Cole all but hopped into his arms and Robb lifted him, “Here you go, Mommy!”

With that Cole swung back his arms and pushed them forward and Ella jumped up but seemed to miss it.

“I need a teammate over here!” she called to them.

“Comingggggg,” Wes called, sprinting over without a second’s hesitation.

She leaned down and asked him something and he nodded so she bent down, and Wes got on her back.

“Alright Cole, we can do this,” Robb psyched himself up.

One of Wes’ arms was wrapped around Ella’s neck as the other hit the ball of light and Cole went to hit it with nearly his entire body.

“GOOD ONE,” Wes called to him sweetly, before his face knit in concentration and hit it back.

“YOU TOO!” Cole agreed before doing it again.

After a little while his arms were a little tired and he imagined that Ella’s back was too so he convinced them to move on. They headed towards the butterfly house first and he watched as Cole’s eyes practically left his head as he looked around in surprise.

“Wow,” Ella mirrored her son’s admiration.

He watched as she held out her arm, her palm tilted towards the ceiling, perfectly still. Within seconds a large green butterfly landed on the tips of her fingers.

“Daddy…” Wes whispered, watching the creature’s wings slow.

Ella looked at Cole, “Just look with your eyes, okay, baby?”

“Yes Mommy,” Cole agreed.

She moved her hand slowly, purposefully, and he wondered if she had been a ballet dancer when she was younger. The butterfly was not spooked and she lowered her hand so that it was at eye level with the boys.

“No touching, honey, alright?” he asked as he looked at it with what he was sure was an awe that equaled the boys’.

Wes nodded and he and Cole stepped forward, assessing the tiny, beautiful creature. Robb looked at Ella and smiled. She smiled back and then he gestured to her shoulder where a small monarch had landed.

“Are you some sort of butterfly whisperer?” he wondered.

“Here Wes,” Ella crouched down further, “Place your hand on my shoulder and see if she’ll climb on.”

“Gentle,” he reminded him.

Wes nodded and placed his hand softly on her shoulder, near to but not touching the butterfly. With a patience he’d never seen from his son, he waited as the butterfly slowly moved onto his hand.

He turned to look up at him, his eyes as wide as saucers and Robb pulled out his phone to snap a picture of the butterfly on Wes’ knuckles, his toothy grin somewhat blurred in the background.

The butterfly flew off of Wes a moment later and the boys focused on the one still resting on Ella’s fingertips. He took a picture of that as well, their faces identical images of wonder.

This was why he had recommended the museum and not the park, those faces. He wanted to show Wes everything in the world because he wanted him to see it, but also selfishly, because watching him take it in allowed his own experience to fade away and see it with fresh eyes once again.

“He matches your eyes,” Wes informed Ella and then said to Cole, “Yours too!”

She laughed lightly and as though she sensed the boys would only have another thirty seconds of attention for this, she lifted her hand once again and moved her fingertips slightly until the creature flew away. They all watched it go and then headed towards the bubble room.

“That was SO cool,” Wes said, taking his hand.

“You were so good with that butterfly, honey,” he congratulated him.

There were certain lessons he wanted to teach his son without words, and he hoped this could be one of them. That when it came to delicate, beautiful things it was better to wait patiently for them to crawl into your hand rather than try to snatch them up. That catching wondrous creatures wasn’t nearly as gratifying as being their safe place to land.

The bubble room was busier than the others had been, but they found a couple of seats and the boys pulled out wands from the trays.

Cole held his up in front of him and Robb blew it gently, and Cole let out an adorable giggle as a truly shockingly large bubble formed.

“Should we see if it will come to us?” Ella asked Wes.

Wes nodded, stepping in between her legs and handing her his wand. He placed his hand on top of hers as they gingerly moved it forward and he heard the boys gasp as they pulled it away to find the bubble now attached to their wand instead.

There were some lessons that were learned quickly, like not to touch the stove or always looking both ways when he crossed the street, and others that might take longer. So, it was with little surprise that Robb watched his son poke the large bubble, making it burst.

In truth, Robb had been fighting the urge to do so as well.

Ella gasped in surprise, making Wes and Cole giggle and then the boys started playing in earnest, blowing bubbles in each other’s and his and Ella’s faces. Waving the wands until streams of bubbles flowed out.

Their hands were soapy and the cuffs of their shirts damp before they decided they were ready to move on. They went and saw a few more exhibits and he left them all briefly to go get them signed up for the planetarium’s 12 o’clock showing.

“I might go get some juice for Cole,” Ella said to him as the boys climbed on a metal structure, “Would Wes want some too? Not apple of course…”

“Yeah that’d be great,” he agreed, unsurprised that she had remembered. “Should we come with?”

She smiled, “I don’t think we’ll make it out without something terrible for them if they do. Do you mind?”

“No,” he shook his head, “Not at all, uh here,” he went to reach for his wallet.

“Don’t be silly,” she waved him off, “I think I might get myself a coffee… _5 am remember_? Can I get you anything?”

“A water would be great, thanks,” he agreed.

She told Cole to stick close to him and Wes and then headed towards the small café just across the way. He saw her get into line and then turned his attention back to the boys, desperate for neither of them to fall and crack their heads.

It was really gratifying watching them play together. Everything he’d heard from Mr. Tarly and Gilly and Ella had suggested that they did well, but it wasn’t the same as seeing it. They had fairly different temperaments. Cole’s excitement was wider and Wes’ deeper. Cole wanted to experience everything at once, likely why he had a penchant for wandering, whereas Wes could stay focused on one thing for a very long time. In spite of that though they paced well with one another, and neither were prone to the singularity of vision that some only children were.

He helped Cole down when he’d gotten a little too high and the little boy slipped his hand into his, “Where’s Mommy? She can climb super high.”

Robb smiled before looking around for her. The line hadn’t been very long when she’d gotten into it, and he saw her balancing a tray, halfway in between the café and where they were standing, some guy talking to her.

“Let’s get you down, Wes,” he said, and his son let him pry him from the climbing structure.

He took one of their hands in each of his and walked them towards Ella. If it seemed like she was enjoying the conversation he wouldn’t want to cramp her style, but it didn’t seem like she was. Even from a distance.

“Here, Ella, let me grab that,” he said, reaching out for the tray.

She turned to him, a note of relief on her face and offered it to him, “Thanks.”

“Mommy!” Cole took advantage of her hands being free and jumped at her, landing with his arms around her waist and his feet on top of hers. “I climbed SO high.”

“You did?” Ella smiled down at him.

“Mommy…” the guy who had been talking to her repeated.

“That’s me,” Ella responded curtly.

The guy made a bunch of excuses before walking away quickly. Ella didn’t seem to much mind and took the boys’ juice boxes out of the tray and opened one and then the other, handing them to Cole and Wes. He handed her the coffee and grabbed the water and the tossed the train in the trash.

It was 11:55 so they headed towards the planetarium, Wes and Cole walking a bit ahead as Wes already knew the way.

“Sorry for intruding,” he said, in case they had.

“Are you kidding? I was about to send up a flare,” she joked.

He smiled but couldn’t help wondering, “Why didn’t you just tell him to fuck off?” She blushed and he shook his head, “I’m sorry.”

“No, I just always forget that’s an option,” she laughed lightly. Then admitted, “Though in all honesty, usually all I have to do is mention Cole and that about does it.”

His stomach clenched, “Are you serious?”

“Yeah, haven’t you found that?” she asked and then rolled her eyes, “What am I asking, of course you haven’t.”

He didn’t have to ask for clarification. The view on single moms and single dads were entirely contradictory. Women often seemed _more_ interested in him when they learned about Wes.

“Well, they don’t know what they’re missing,” he offered.

He said it because it was true, and because it was the sort of thing he’d say to Gilly, but it felt different leaving his tongue than it might have had he said it to her.

Wrong, somehow.

***

There were very few things more romantic than sitting next to a boy you were enamored with, looking up at the stars.

“Look at that one!” Wes whispered in her ear, pointing up towards the heavens.

“Ooooh,” she agreed.

The seating arrangements had been Wes’ idea. He and Robb had been here many times before, so Wes reasoned that it made sense for one of each of them to sit next to her and Cole to _explain_ things if needed.

She had wondered briefly if Cole would hesitate, but he’d settled in next to Robb happily, the two of them chattering about something. Wes’ Dad was a person of interest to her son, with his booming voice and easy smile that he always directed at him. It was clear Wes idolized him, and Cole had followed suit.

“Oooh a shooting star,” Wes said, “Cole look.”

“Yeaaaah,” Cole agreed, the pair looking up in wonder.

She leaned her head back against the seat. It was nice and cool in here and it was beautiful, watching the stars shift above. When it wasn’t cloudy in the Riverlands, the stars were visible at night, unlike in King’s Landing, but even still it was nothing like this.

She glanced over at Robb, saw him looking up in wonder too. He turned when he felt her gaze and there was nothing else to do but smile at him and he returned it with a small one of his own before they both looked back up.

The show was about forty-five minutes and Cole and Wes couldn’t stop talking when they got out of it, though she knew that between her son’s early wake up and it nearing his naptime, the adrenaline of the morning would only last him so long.

“Can we go back to the bubble room?” Cole asked over his shoulder.

Robb glanced at her and she held up both hands and he nodded, before answering, “Yeah but just for a few minutes.”

She wanted to get Cole home and fed before he fell asleep in his plate and Robb probably wanted the same for Wes.

The boys walked ahead and as they got back to the bubble room, Wes said, “I’m gonna blow the biggest bubble EVER.”

“Ever, huh?” Robb asked, kneeling down and pushing his sleeves up, “Go get ‘em, honey.”

She pushed Cole’s up too, and the boys ran deeper into the room while she and Robb stood in the doorway.

“That’s nice,” she told him before she could stop herself. He looked at her and she explained, “That you call him ‘honey’.”

She’d noticed it the week before and it had struck her as different, but nice.

“Most sons hear a lot of _buddy_ or _champ_ from their Dad’s,” she explained.

“ _Big man, little man,_ ” Robb offered, and she smiled and nodded. He shrugged, “Yeah I uh, it’s just me so. He should hear it from someone.”

Her stomach clenched at what an idiot she was. She had known that he was a widower, had since before she met him. They’d been at orientation and a bunch of the Mommys had been huddled together and when he’d walked in, they’d all climbed all over each other trying to note different tidbits they’d picked up.

_That’s Robb Stark. His son is Wes. He’s from up North, somewhere. Yes, he’s one of those Starks. Unmarried. No, they aren’t divorced, look he’s still wearing his ring. She died._

They’d assessed him like a prime piece of inventory and one or two of them had fluffed their hair before going to greet him, in spite of the wedding bands around their slender fingers.

“Yeah,” she agreed. She normally wouldn’t but considering he was a single parent too she felt comfortable confessing, “I know what you mean. I’m trying to learn all these things I never had to before so that I can teach Cole.”

He turned to her and his eyes crinkled slightly, “Like what?”

She shrugged, “Silly things, like how to change a tire, which admittedly he won’t need for a while and is something I should know anyway. But I’ve been working on learning to throw a baseball. I understand the concept, of course, but I want to teach him the right way to do it.”

“That’s cool,” Robb told her, sounding like he meant it.

“Yeah I mean, I want him to know all those things boys don’t learn, like how to cook and sew a button but…,” she trailed off as her heart seized slightly. Robb did more than turn his head, he turned his whole body, so she did the same. He didn’t push further than that, he just stood there, still as stone until she realized he would until she was ready to say more. Which oddly convinced her to. “I just don’t want him to not learn things because he only has me.”

“Yeah,” Robb smiled sadly, “Yeah.”

She hadn’t meant to depress him. They had been having such a nice time. It was just so rare that she spoke to anyone who might understand. She’d resisted speaking of Trystane again in therapy that week, not willing to share him with Dr. Dayne yet.

It was more than that though. To speak of him, to share him, left her so exposed and raw, and to do so only to get sympathy but no understanding back didn’t feel like a fair trade.

“If you wanted,” Robb started, “I could teach-“

She jumped in, “That’s so kind of you, but I think I should be the one to teach him.”

He nodded, “So do I. So, I was going to offer to teach… you.”

“Me?” she asked, a wide smile on her face before she covered it. He looked at her, a confused smile on his face. “Oh really?”

“Yeah,” he agreed, his smiled widening, “Yeah, I’d be happy to.”

“Thank you,” she said and then looked up at him, “Really, thanks.”

He nodded, the smile had left his face but not his eyes and they looked at each other for another moment before turning back to the kids.

“You may have to return the favor one of these days,” he told her. She was about to agree when he said, “Starting with your famous Maximus impression.”

It caught her so by surprise that she threw her head back and laughed, though made no promises. They gave the kids another few minutes and then brought them back outside. It had been such a successful day that neither of them even asked to go to the gift shop and by the time Robb pulled out of the parking lot both had fallen asleep.

“What does Cole charge for babysitting?” Robb asked her as he got back onto the highway.

She smiled, “I think this is what we call _payment in-kind_.”

“He’s a really great kid, Ella,” Robb told her, his eyes on the road.

“That’s really nice to hear,” she told him genuinely. “I’m so glad they became friends. Wes… this may seem strange but it’s like they can be gentle together.”

Robb swallowed and nodded, “I know what you mean. It doesn’t seem strange at all.”

She wondered briefly if all those women who wrote articles about toxic masculinity had ever encountered someone like Robb Stark, with his broad shoulders and booming voice, who called his son _honey_ and urged soft, quiet fingers.

Ignoring that thought she suggested, “We should set up another playdate for them this week. Cole insisted I didn’t make _any_ others until we knew what day Wes was free.”

Robb smiled and said, “We can do whatever day works for you guys.” Then admitted, “He hasn’t really taken to anyone else just yet.”

“Let’s do two then, maybe?” she asked, then thought about it, “And I could invite one of the other boys on the second one. Will Bracken is nice. Unless you think that would overwhelm him.”

“No,” Robb answered quickly, “I think that’d be… great. But the first one at our house. Unless Cole is afraid of dogs.”

“Not at all,” she noted and then asked, “What kind is he?”

Robb told her all about Grey Wind, the husky mix that he’d had since before Wes was born. He answered all her questions and then when it was clear the boys weren’t waking up, she confessed that she was considering one for Cole. Robb then amended his statements, saying that as wonderful as Grey Wind was, the breed wasn’t known for their obedience, and suggested some of the same breeds she’d read about last week.

When he pulled down her driveway their voices quieted, and she wondered if she’d be able to get Cole out without waking either of the boys.

“Thank you again, for letting me tag along,” she said.

“It was fun,” he agreed.

“Okay, I’m going to get out and unlock the door and then come back and get him if that’s alright,” she said, getting out of the car and closing the door quietly.

She walked up her front steps and unlocked the door, pushing it open and dropping her bag and turned back to get Cole from the car, only to see Robb walking around it, holding Cole’s car seat, her son still sleeping inside of it.

“Isn’t that heavy?” she wondered.

“Yes,” he agreed with a weak smile and she laughed before opening the door wider for him.

Robb set him down and stood up, “I’ve gotta get Wes home but we had a great time.”

“Us too,” she agreed. “See you Monday.”

“Monday?” he asked.

“At drop-off,” she reminded him.

“Right,” he nodded with a smile that disappeared quickly, “Right. See you then. Have a good weekend.”

She waved at him and closed the door as he drove off and then crouched down and unclasped Cole’s car seat, pulling his arms out as gently as she was able before picking him up into her arms. There would be a day soon when he would be too big for her to carry like this, but not yet and she brought him up the stairs and walked down the hallway to his room.

She laid him in bed and took off his shoes, pulling the covers up and over him.

“Mommy,” he said.

“Go to sleep, baby,” she urged.

“I didn’t see Daddy,” he told her, his eyes closed.

“You didn’t?” she asked softly.

“No,” he rolled over, grabbing her hand, “Did you?”

“Oh yeah,” she nodded. Kicking her own shoes off and lying down next to him, “That shooting star? That was your Daddy’s laugh. And the ones that twinkled _so_ brightly? Those were his eyes.”

“Oh,” he snuggled into her, “I saw those, I just didn’t know they were Daddy.”

“Yeah, baby,” she stroked his dark curls, breathing him in, “Your Daddy was everywhere, filling the _whole_ sky.”

Contented, Cole fell back to sleep and she lay there in the dark, looking up at the stars on his ceiling, hoping to see Trystane in one of those.

Because she had lied. She hadn’t seen him, she hadn’t looked for him, even. Not because she didn’t want to, she did, desperately. But because there was something about doing it today that felt different.

Wrong, somehow.


	5. Chapter 5

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I am LOVING this story and I am so pleased that people are enjoying it! I'll admit I'm REALLY struggling writing them because I'm so used to writing them just like INSTANTLY feeling something, so if this feels a little start and stop some of it is intentional and some of it is me failing my way through life.
> 
> Anyway, this chapter is mostly from Myrcella's perspective, but there is Robb at the end!

Her fingers were still shaking when she pulled down the drive.

_“Stop it_ ,” she ordered firmly.

Her body ignored her though.

_“Come on,”_ she yelled at herself, hitting the steering wheel.

It was with shaky fingers though, and her hand slipped, telling her that her palms were sweating too.

She tried to focus on the sight in front of her. The Starks home was a sprawling red brick with large windows and a happy look to it. Their dark green door, the same color as her shutters.

Her fingers were still shaking though and her mouth was dry. She put her car in park and tried to grip the steering wheel to stop her fingers. It worked, but then her legs started going.

There was no way that she could go into the house like this. She was meant to be picking up Cole but she couldn’t see him until she had calmed down.

This was the first time she’d left a therapy appointment so agitated. Dr. Dayne had been gentle during their second and third sessions but today she had pushed her. Myrcella had made it clear she wasn’t ready to speak about Trystane, so Dr. Dayne asked her about her family, her childhood. It was such a cliché, but it had left her rattled in a way she rarely allowed herself to be.

_“Tell me about your mother,” Dr. Dayne said._

_Myrcella smiled, “Really?”_

_“Yes, really,” Dr. Dayne nodded, “You can laugh, but it won’t make me stop asking.”_

_“What would you like to know?” Myrcella crossed her legs, folding her hands in her lap._

_“Why you just made yourself smaller at the thought of her.”_

Myrcella rarely thought about her mother. They spoke twice a week and saw one another twice a year and the rest of the time she was just a voice in the back of her head as she arranged flowers or dressed for the day.

Speaking about her mother had lead her to speaking about her father and Joffrey and when she’d closed down Dr. Dayne had pushed further. She was just doing her job, Myrcella knew, but that didn’t make it any easier.

_“Stop it,” Myrcella ordered._

_“Stop what?” Dr. Dayne asked calmly._

_“Treating me like I’m some sort of victim,” Myrcella noted._

_“I wasn’t aware that I was,” Dr. Dayne. “What makes you say that?”_

_“I can see it, that look in your eyes,” Myrcella explained. “Like you think I deserved better.”_

_“Do you disagree?”_

Her therapist was so determined to find something, something dark and desperate within her. It was vicious, almost, and it made her feel like there was something wrong with her. Something obvious that she was somehow missing. As though she was walking around with a sign everyone could see that she didn’t know how to remove.

It didn’t satisfy Dr. Dayne to hear that her parents had drank too much and loved each other too little, but that she had never doubted they loved her. She didn’t accept that it hadn’t left some wound deep within her.

There was nothing that bothered Myrcella more than feeling deficient.

As a single mother, she should have been used to it. She wasn’t enough, she never could be, and she woke every morning with that understanding and went to bed every night trying to banish it. So, for Dr. Dayne to so obviously see it meant that others did too.

Maybe even Cole.

_“Stop it,_ ” she ordered again.

Thoughts of her son forced adrenaline into bloodstream that allowed her to take deep, calming breaths.

_Cole_. His little arms around her neck. _Cole._ His excited laugh. _Cole._ The way he said _Mommy_.

A knock on her window made her yelp in surprise and she turned to see Robb standing there. She rolled down her window and he smiled kindly at her.

“Hey, you alright?” he asked.

“Yes,” she nodded, “I was just… spacing out.”

He looked at her like he didn’t quite believe her, and she knew then that she was right. Everyone could see it.

“Did you just get here?” he asked.

“Yes, I was just about to go in to get Cole,” she agreed, “Did you just get home?”

She hadn’t seen him pull in and she wondered how long he’d been behind her. Wondered what he’d seen.

“Yeah, just pulled in a second ago,” Robb told her, then offered quickly, “Meeting got canceled so I got out a bit early.”

“That’s nice,” she tried for a smile, and his face mirrored it. “Should we…?”

“Oh, yeah,” he agreed then looked up at the sky, “You might want to roll this up though, it’ll rain in a minute.”

There was no time in the Riverlands where that statement might be untrue, even if the sky was blue and there wasn’t a cloud to be seen. They could gather quickly in battle formations, rain falling like arrows within seconds.

She rolled up the window and went to open her door but Robb was already pulling it open for her, so she got out of the car.

“How do we think they did?” Robb asked her as they walked to his front door.

“Wonderfully,” she told him honestly. “Though whether Gilly survived…”

“She’s made of stern stuff, don’t worry about her,” Robb noted and then stage-whispered, “ _Here we go._ ” He then opened the door and called, “ _Honeyyyy I’m homeeeee._ ”

Myrcella tucked a lock of hair behind her ear with purposeful, steady fingers before Cole and Wes appeared in the front hall. They had clearly thought it was just Robb, which was exciting enough but their eyes all but bugged out of their heads when they saw her standing there too and then the foyer was a mess of little arms and excited voices and a very fluffy wagging tail.

“MOMMYMOMMYMOMMY,” Cole burrowed into her knees.

“Hi baby,” she knelt down so that she could hug him to her, picking him up.

His little arms wrapped around her neck and he laid his head on her shoulder.

“You smell good,” he told her.

“ _You_ smell good,” she told him.

“Do I?!” Wes asked from Robb’s arms.

Robb smirked and she couldn’t help but smile before narrowing her eyes, “Hmmm, let me see.” She leaned forward and sniffed his hair before plopping a kiss on the apple of his cheek, “You smell _delicious_.”

“Oh hi, you’re all here!” Gilly game into the room, looking surprisingly put together for having just spent the afternoon with the boys on her own.

“My meeting was cancelled,” Robb told her.

Gilly looked at him with wide eyes and nodded, “Okay. Great. Welcome home, hi Ella, it’s nice to see you.”

“You too, how’d we do?” she wondered.

“They,” Gilly said sternly, looking at the two boys, then smiled, “Were angels. Weren’t you?”

“YEAH,” Cole and Wes said in unison.

“They were actually just helping me with dinner, any chance Cole can stay and finish up? He’s a wizard with a melon scooper,” Gilly explained.

“Is that so?” Myrcella wondered, looking at her son who smiled proudly.

“Yeah sorry, I didn’t mean to make you stand here, come on in, can I get you something to drink?” Robb asked.

Usually she would demure but though her hands had stopped shaking, her mouth was still dry and she was feeling a little weak.

“I’d love a glass of water if it isn’t too much trouble,” she nodded.

They all walked into their large, sunny kitchen. It had white marble countertops and beautiful dark blue subway tiling, and she’d realized the first time she’d been here, that it was as Gilly had suggested, incredible. As was the spread she had assembled.

“Wow,” she nodded.

Gilly smiled, “Wes liked your hummus so much that we went a little _crazy_ about it, didn’t we?”

“It’s sooo good,” Wes agreed.

“It really is,” Robb said as he handed her a glass of ice water.

“Thank you,” she said for both the compliment and the drink and then brought Cole over to where he had apparently been scooping a watermelon. “Let’s see this wizarding.”

Cole picked up the scoop and dug it gently into the watermelon, and then with both hands pushed the lever down and a perfect little pink ball dropped into the bowl in front of them.

“Wow, that is some _serious_ skill,” Robb agreed.

“I _know_ ,” Cole agreed, making Robb smile.

She couldn’t help but smile as well but reminded him, “Say _thank you_ baby.”

“Thank you, baby,” Cole answered distractedly as he worked on creating a little ball.

Myrcella glanced at Robb who had covered his face to hide his smile before turning back to Wes.

“And what about you?” Robb asked him, “You just letting Cole do all the work?”

“I made the salad!” Wes protested.

She and Robb both looked at Gilly who nodded, “Yeah I’ve just been watching soap operas all afternoon.”

A giggle escaped her lips and Robb’s chuckle joined it. She took a sip of water and glanced around the kitchen, wondering what she should make for dinner. The salmon she had in the fridge needed to be marinaded so she’d do that for tomorrow, but it would be too late to start for dinner tonight. Maybe she’d give Cole a treat and do breakfast for dinner. He loved a good omelet, and it would help her get rid of some things in the fridge.

“Alright, finish up those scoooops so we can let them enjoy their dinner,” she said to Cole.

“Stay,” Wes said.

He really was one of the sweetest kids in the world. There were only one or two of Cole’s friends that she didn’t care for, and that was entirely the fault of their parents’, but he could have had a hundred friends and Wes still would have been her favorite.

With his mop of brown hair and his wide blue eyes and a grin that could stop traffic, it’d be easy to dismiss him as merely cute, but Wes Stark was _good_.

Kind and fair-minded, generous, not just with toys but with his feelings.

“Oh, sweetheart that’s so nice of you,” she said, but was unsure of what to say next.

If she said _we don’t want to intrude_ that was trapping them in to saying they wouldn’t be, if she said they had plans that would be a lie and she didn’t like to lie, especially not in front of Cole.

“You should stay,” Gilly agreed before she could say anything for her. “If not, we’ll all be eating leftovers for a week.” Then looked at Robb and scrunched her nose, “Well at least two days, anyway.”

Robb narrowed his eyes at Gilly but grinned and then turned to her and nodded, “You guys should stay. No pressure but… don’t you want to try Cole’s watermelon balls? Or Wes’ salad?”

Myrcella smiled and then Cole looked up at her and said, “Can we Mommy? Gilly’s the _best_ cook.”

She placed down her glass and smacked her other hand on the counter, “World. Shattered.”

“Oh E-,” Gilly started but Myrcella winked at her.

“No,” Cole giggled, dropping the scooper, “No Mommy noooooo I’ll put it back togetherrrrr.”

With that he jumped back into her arms and pressed kisses to her cheek.

She looked at Robb who was grinning at them and she raised her eyebrow. He nodded and then glanced meaningfully at Wes and mouthed _really_.

“Well Wes, we would _love_ to stay,” she agreed, “How can I help?”

“Just supervise,” Gilly grinned at her and then went into the cupboard and grabbed out plates and handed them to Robb, “ _You_ can set the table though.”

There was a rumor amongst the Mommies that there was something going on between Gilly and Robb. Not because of anything they had done, of course, in fact she doubted that any of them had ever seen the pair of them together. It was just the facts of it, a young, handsome single father and his even younger, pretty nanny. They were the stuff of romance novels, and there was nothing the Mommies liked more than a potential scandal.

Though why two single people having a relationship would be a scandal she didn’t know.

Either way, she wondered if any of them would be able to repeat it after seeing them together. Their relationship was not one of employer and employee, that was obvious, but neither was it romantic. In truth it was almost familial, the way Gilly teased Robb whether he was in the room or not, the way Robb seemed to treat her like the boss.

Robb went to the table and doled out the plates and then looked at Gilly, “We’re one short.”

“Actually now that you’re both here I thought I might take off,” Gilly said as she poured some white sauce into a small bowl.

Myrcella wondered if the boys had worn her out more than she let on. She certainly seemed capable of handling them, but they were very exuberant.

“Oh really?” Robb asked her pointedly. Then said, “Boys why don’t you go wash up?”

Cole and Wes hopped off their seats and ran towards the powder room down the hall.

“So uh, you’re running off rather _quickly_ ,” Robb noted.

Gilly rolled her eyes, shoving the bowl and another into his hands, “It’s 5:30.”

“Mmm _hmm_ ,” Robb agreed bringing the bowls over to the table, though he turned to her and said, “She’s got a date.”

Myrcella’s mouth dropped open and she looked at Gilly, “Is it with the same guy as last week?”

Robb turned to Gilly too and waited and Gilly tried to busy herself dressing the salad but neither of them were budging.

“No,” Gilly said finally, “I won’t be seeing him again. Not that I ever did at all.”

“What?” Robb asked.

“Well,” Gilly said, “He sort of stood me up.”

“WHAT?” Myrcella asked.

She abhorred bad manners and there was almost nothing on earth ruder than standing someone up for a date. Besides it was _Gilly_. She was sweet and smart and pretty and _wonderful_.

“What’s his name?” Robb asked.

“Robb!” Gilly admonished.

“She’s right,” Myrcella agreed and before he could protest, she picked up the forks and knives Gilly had laid out on the counter and said, “Just show me his picture, you can just leave your phone open accidentally. You need not know _anything_ further.”

Robb let out a surprised, hearty laugh and Gilly sighed in exasperation.

“Wait so who is this other guy?” Myrcella realized.

She was met with silence as she put forks and knives at two spaces and just forks at the others and turned to find Gilly blushing.

Perhaps they shouldn’t tease her so much. Myrcella didn’t know her all that well and it was possible this could be construed as them ganging up on her.

But as Myrcella looked at her she realized this wasn’t a blush of embarrassment, it was one of infatuation.

“Gilly…” Robb must have seen it too.

She sighed and looked around, “Where are those boys?” When it became clear Wes and Cole weren’t going to save her, she said, “Well _after_ the unnamed man stood me up I was sitting at the table feeling a little rejected and… S…omeone came over and asked if he could keep me company and we got to talking and he’s lovely and I’m not saying anything else about it. For now. Not until I know that it’s really something. Okay?”

“Yeah,” Robb nodded, “Okay. Go have fun, Gilly. I’ll finish up here.”

Gilly opened her mouth, likely to tell him where half a dozen things were, so Myrcella said, “We’ve got it. Go have fun. And… wear your hair up.” Gilly touched it and looked at her, her eyes wide, “That neck, those eyes. You’ll just _dazzle_ him.”

Gilly smiled, “Thank you.”

Myrcella felt her fingers start to shake again and she gripped onto the counter as casually as she was able. She remember that look, that _hope_ , being warm and shivering all at the same time. The way nothing felt quite right until you saw _him_.

She smiled back as much as she was able and it was enough because Gilly went and grabbed her things and waved at her.

“Bye boooooys!” Gilly called.

Just like that little hoofs ran into the kitchen.

“Love you,” Wes said to her.

“Love you too,” Gilly agreed.

“Thank you, Gilly!” Cole said before she had to remind him and Gilly smiled at her and then ruffled Cole’s hair.

“I’m just going to walk her out,” Robb told her.

She nodded, “I’ll get them to the table.”

Gilly and Robb walked out and she settled Cole and Wes at the table and brought the salad over, saving the fruit for when they were done.

“Wes do you eat everything here?” she asked him.

“Yeah! And _lots of it_ ,” he said proudly.

She put healthy portions of the chicken and salad and rice and some of the vegetables.

“Do you dip or like it on top?” she asked, picking up the sauce.

“Dip, please,” he said, picking up a roasted pepper and munching on it.

She helped him to some hummus and then cut up his chicken into bite sized pieces. Robb came back in a minute later and brought cups of water over to the table for Wes and Cole and then gestured to all the bowls and she nodded so Robb put some of everything on Cole’s plate.

“Dip or drizzle,” Robb asked him.

“Drizzle please,” Cole confirmed. Robb drizzled a portion that would be woefully underdoing it and Cole affirmed that by saying, “More please.” Robb poured some more on, “More.”

“It’s really more of a downpour than a drizzle,” she joked and Robb grinned, dropping a generous amount until Cole thanked him.

She sat down next to Cole, leaving the head of the table for Robb and thanked him when he passed her the vegetables. They both assembled their plates as the boys started eating.

Cole and Wes told them all about their afternoon. They’d had a dragon hunt (hide-and-seek) and gone camping (made a fort in the living room) and it was the general consensus that it had been a very good afternoon indeed.

It made her wish she hadn’t agreed to change her appointment with Dr. Dayne this week. Camping with the boys and cooking with Gilly seemed infinitely better for her mental health than arguing with her therapist.

She pushed that thought out of her mind though and enjoyed the food, which really was better than nearly anything she’d ever tasted, and the company.

“You guys can eat here tomorrow too,” Wes informed her earnestly as he wrestled with a piece of lettuce.

She smiled, “Well I’m not sure that we can tomorrow, but we’ll have to have you and your Dad over for dinner at our house sometime. How does that sound?”

“Great!” Wes agreed.

“YEAH,” Cole seconded.

She glanced at Robb as he looked at her, and nodded, “That’d be nice.”

The boys finished their dinner quickly and Robb brought over the bowl of fruit, which they attacked like wild beasts.

“Why do you think watermelon tastes better as a ball?” Robb asked them thoughtfully.

“Hmm,” Cole said.

Wes bit into his own, “I don’t know. Ella?”

They all turned to look at her and she realized that she had to say _something_. The truth of the matter was, she didn’t know why it tasted better that way, it just did.

“Science,” she answered with a lot of confidence.

“Science,” Robb repeated, nodding, as though it made a lot of sense. “I’m going to have to write that down.”

She laughed as Cole tugged on her sleeve and she turned to him, “Yes baby?”

“Do we have a scooper?” he asked.

“I think we do somewhere,” she agreed, “I’ll try to find it. What else could we scoop?”

“Ice cream,” Wes suggested.

“Meat,” Cole noted.

“So how soon can you have us for dinner?” Robb joked.

The boys had their share of fruit and then asked to go play. She and Robb did a parents conference while seated at the table and not speaking and then agreed that they could play while they finished eating and cleaning up.

As the boys left she realized that she had no idea what to say to him. They walked out of school together most mornings and he’d picked Wes up after his playdate on Thursday, but that was different, with the hustle bustle of a day starting or ending. Sitting here with him was different, and she realized she knew very little about him.

She knew that he ran Tully Corp., but she’d known that since before she’d met him, having read the piece in the Times about the transition. It had been a surprise, there was an uncle or someone whom everyone had expected to inherit, but not a scandal. She knew that he’d moved them away from the old energy and started a focus on renewable, diversified their real estate to include affordable housing initiatives.

That wasn’t really casual dinner conversation though.

“I have no idea what to say,” he told her.

“Me either,” she smiled.

She wondered if that meant he didn’t date either. It wasn’t an appropriate question to ask, and she didn’t want him to think that she’d be implying that this was a date. But she couldn’t help but be curious. There were other single parents in Cole’s class but most of them were separated or divorced and seemed to be constantly flaunting their dating lives, as though all the other parents would go and tell their exes. Which admittedly wasn’t far off.

“Were you okay earlier?” he asked. “I’m sorry you don’t have to tell me anything, but you seemed a little…”

“Yeah, I was a little…” she confirmed. “But I’m okay, thanks. What do you guys have up for the long weekend?”

A wide smile overtook Robb’s face, “My sister and brother-in-law and niece are coming to visit.”

“Is that the famous Lya?” she wondered.

“Yeah,” Robb grinned, “She is Wes’ hero. Mine too.”

“That’s nice, that they’re so close.” Then she remembered, “I’m not sure if you’ve seen it but they are actually doing a harvest festival thing starting Friday. May be worth checking out if you guys need to get them out of the house.”

“I forgot that was this weekend, down by the river, right?” he asked, and she nodded, “Yeah that’s a good idea… would you guys want to come?”

“You don’t have to…”

“I know,” he agreed and shrugged, “And I’m not. If it isn’t obvious, Wes loves having you guys around. Cole and Lya will get on like a house on fire and I think you and my sister, Sansa, would too actually. There’s no pressure obviously and we can take Cole if you want some time to yourself but… you really _don’t_ have to worry about being an intrusion with us.” 

It was such a nice thing to say, and it made her wonder if he felt what she did. That as much as he loved Wes and as close as they were, sometimes he was afraid that he wasn’t enough. Enough stimulation, enough fun. Just enough, in general.

In truth, she had been thinking of taking Cole down that weekend anyway, and he’d have a lot more fun with Wes and his cousin than just her. 

“Cole would love it,” she agreed, “So would I.”

“Good,” he offered, a full sentence.

They finished eating and cleared the table. She offered to do the dishes since she didn’t know where anything was, and he covered up the food and then came over to dry.

“Gilly really is the best cook,” she informed him.

“Well, it was _your_ hummus recipe or _wummass_ as Wes calls it, that started this all off,” Robb pointed out. “I hope we didn’t screw up your dinner plans though.”

“Not a bit,” she answered, handing him one of the serving bowls, “It was great not to have to think about what to make… my little something.”

“Your what?” Robb asked.

Her cheeks colored. She blamed it on the warm, running water, the comforting monotony of doing dishes, that made that slip out.

“Sorry it’s this stupid thing,” she shook her head.

“I sort of doubt that,” he offered gently.

She couldn’t look at him, she just kept scrubbing a dish that was well beyond clean, “I’ve started seeing a therapist. I’m okay and everything, you know um, nothing is wrong but –“

“That’s obvious,” he agreed. She turned to look at him and his eyes crinkled, “You’re sort of intimidatingly together, in case you weren’t aware.”

She shook her head, “I wasn’t.”

“Well you are,” he noted, “And I’m not the only one who thinks so. I haven’t seen one before, but it’s not because I think I don’t need one. I just… can’t bring myself too. So, on top of being intimidatingly together, you’re brave, too.” 

“Why are you so nice?” she wondered.

He chuckled, “Is that a character flaw or something? And I’m just being honest. Are you getting a lot out of it, if you don’t mind my asking?”

“Well,” she shrugged, “It’s like anything else right? You get out of it what you put into it. So… no.”

He smiled sympathetically, “I’m sure I’d be the same. But what’s the little thing?”

“She wants me to do a little something for myself every day,” she sighed.

“Huh,” Robb nodded. “Seems simple enough.”

“ _You_ try it for a week and then tell me that,” she teased.

“Deal,” he grinned, holding out his hand.

She took the dish cloth from his other and dried her hand and then shook his.

They then turned back to their tasks. They could hear Cole and Wes in the other room playing something happily, but in the kitchen it was just the sound of running water.

“So,” he said, as he dried the salad bowl, “Does this count?”

She rinsed the chicken platter, focusing on the sudsy water, “It does to me.”

***

He’d had a strange dream again. It was with Jeyne. He could place everything. The restaurant they’d gone to on their second date. The nerves that had been there. That light pink dress that showed him just enough to know he wouldn’t breathe correctly until he saw everything else. He could hear her laughter, her doe eyes looking at him over her menu in such a way that he knew she was smiling. He could even taste the chicken he’d eaten. It was right, so perfectly right. Except not. A hand slipping into his, but it wasn’t hers. A beautiful smile that didn’t quite fit on her face.

It was happening more and more. He’d really thought that he’d kicked the dreams for the most part over the summer. They had started to peter out and then with a vengeance they’d returned this fall. Except these weren’t the same gorgeous, painful dreams he’d had before. The ones that were as real and exact as the videos on his phone.

These new ones were like watching their relationship through a fun house mirror. The moments were identifiable, but not replicated.

He wondered if it was just because it had been too much time since he’d truly seen her. It was nearing three years now. He had thought that nothing could tear his memories from him, though in the earliest, worst days, he had almost hoped something could. Now though all he wanted was to have them back.

The conversation with Ella he’d had the night before entered his mind.

Perhaps it was time for him to speak with someone professionally. Though he got through the day he knew that there were things he likely had to work out. Things that had lingered.

Sansa had urged him to, about a year in. She’d urged him to right after but there was nothing then that would make him listen. When she’d mentioned it after the anniversary he’d nodded but not committed. Since then, he’d always had one excuse or another.

The truth was, he was fine. The truth was, he wasn’t sure that he ever could be again.

The idea of drudging all of that up to potentially get nothing back was hugely unappealing. More than that though, he knew that therapy could really drudge things up for people, and he didn’t want to risk destabilizing himself for Wes’ sake.

Ella hadn’t said it, but her session had clearly shaken her yesterday. Usually, it was almost easy to pretend she wasn’t real, just a bright confection that appeared smiling with kind words only to retreat once again. Seeing her in her car though, fighting with herself about something, she had become flesh and bone. A widow, even younger than he was, grappling with loss and likely loneliness too.

It nagged at him, that thought, as he went through his morning routing. Feeding Grey Wind, working out, showering, emails, breakfast with Wes. It nagged at him, wondering if he was using his son as an excuse. If pushing through it could make him better, what sort of father would he be not to at least _try_?

He brought Wes into school and waved to Will Bracken’s Mom as she was on her way out. The playdate had been a success last week, though Ella had informed him at drop-off the next morning that Cole had requested _just Wes again soon_.

The classroom was in its normal state of disarray when they walked inside and he unzipped Wes’ fleece for him and waited as he went to his cubby.

“Good morning,” he greeted Mr. Tarly.

“Robb! He _llo_ ,” Mr. Tarly greeted him in an animated fashion, even for him.

“How are you?” he wondered.

Very suddenly Mr. Tarly’s face was as pink as a piece of bubblegum, “Is it warm in here?”

“Um, no?” Robb answered honestly. “Are you feeling alright?”

“Y _es_ ,” Mr. Tarly answered, his voice going to an octave only Grey Wind would be able to hear. He cleared his throat, “I’m just going to get a spot of water. Excuse me.”

Robb nodded at him and then he heard, “ROBB!”

He turned in time for Cole to launch himself at him and caught him, “And good morning to _you_.”

“Last night was AWESOME!” Cole informed him.

At this point, Cole had made nearly as much an impression on him as he had on Wes. He was fun and easy-going and incredibly kind natured. There was a wildness to him too that reminded him a bit of his little brother Rickon.

“I _agree_ ,” he told him, “You’ll have to come back over soon, alright?”

“Yeah,” Cole agreed then turned towards the door, “Mommy Robb said I could come over again.”

“He did, did he?” Ella smiled, “That was awfully nice of him, wasn’t it?”

Cole nodded and Robb let him down and he headed towards his cubby, shouting for Wes who greeted him with equal excitement.

“Morning,” he greeted her.

“Hi, thank you again for last night,” she said politely.

He nodded, “Can I walk you out?” She laughed, and he couldn’t help but ask, “What?”

“Nothing,” she shook her head, a smile hovering on her face. It was familiar somehow. “Nothing.” He fixed her with a look and she admitted, “Well you don’t have to ask. We always walk out together, no?”

“Oh,” he thought about it and he supposed that was true, “Yeah I guess you’re right.”

They said goodbye to the boys and then walked outside. It was still dry but getting cooler and he saw her car so he headed that way.

“So, would Sunday work? For the Harvest Festival, I mean,” Ella said, “If you still want to. I figured that would give you Saturday just your family… but if you all have plans…”

“Sunday is great,” he agreed.

She seemed very hung up on the idea of intruding and he wasn’t sure how to convince her that she wasn’t without begging her to come. The truth was it had been Sansa’s suggestion to spend time with them. It seemed like she’d been a little more nervous than she’d let on about Wes’ lack of playdates, and since she’d now heard about Cole from both him and Wes, she was curious.

“Great,” she agreed.

“So, I’ve been thinking a lot about our conversation last night,” he told her, “About your therapist…”

Her face crumbled, “Me too. I shouldn’t have said anything, that was _really_ inappropriate and I’m sorry if I made you uncomfortable.”

“No, come on,” he chided, “It wasn’t inappropriate at all. I just started thinking about it and think maybe I should bite the bullet and try it for myself.”

“Oh!” she nodded and smiled kindly, her eyes softening, “I think that’s really great, Robb. I don’t know if I’d inflict mine on you, but if you need some names, I’m sure she has recommendations.”

“If you don’t mind, I’d appreciate it,” he agreed.

“I’ll call her office this morning,” she promised.

“Thank you,” he said and then suggested, “But don’t rush or anything…”

“In my experience,” she suggested gently, “You should take advantage of the nerve while you have it.”

He blew out air and nodded, “Yeah I’m not really sure _why_ I said that because if you could call right at this exact moment, I’d appreciate it.”

She laughed a warm laugh and promised, “Her office doesn’t open until 10, but you’ll have the names by lunchtime.” Then asked, “Is your work email alright?”

He nodded, “Yeah, that’s fine. You still have it, right?”

“Got your calamity card right here,” she patted her bag.

He thanked her and she unlocked her door and went to get in.

“Ella?” he asked.

“Yeah Robb?” she stopped.

“It’s um… good for more than just calamities,” he found himself saying.

A bright, surprised smile landed on her face and she nodded, “You’ve got mine, too.”

With that she waved and got into her car, so he walked towards his car. The parking lot was a madhouse and he inched through it until he got onto the road and drove towards his office. Traffic was light and he arrived before nine, but was unsurprised to see his assistant, Agnes Blackwood, already seated at her desk.

“Good morning, Aggie,” he greeted her.

“Hey Robb,” she smiled as she continued typing, “I’ll come in when you get settled and go through your schedule?”

“Perfect, just finish up whatever you’re doing,” he agreed, knowing that there wasn’t anything that needed immediate attention.

He went into his office and took off his suit jacket, hanging it up along with his briefcase and went and sat at his desk, firing up his computer. He logged in and opened his email and as they started loading in, Aggie came in.

She took a seat opposite his desk and he turned his attention to her.

“It’s a light day,” she noted. “I blocked your morning because I know you wanted to read what the Frey’s sent over. Risk also dropped off their assessment last night. Brynden also has it, so I would expect your _executive time_ to be interrupted.”

Robb smirked, “Yeah don’t even bother trying to defer him. Not worth you losing limbs over.”

“As I’m very attached to them, I appreciate that,” Aggie noted, “And then you have a two o’clock to discuss the plans for Seaguard. I’ve been promised you’ll have new data by one, so I’d expect me to hand it to you right when you’re walking into the meeting and… then you just have a four o’clock.”

He nodded, relishing in the fact that it was a light day. At least as of now, it always changed by ten AM anyway.

“What’s the four?” he wondered.

“Oh it’s with the regional directors,” Aggie explained, “The meeting you had to cancel last night?”


	6. Chapter 6

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> So this chapter bounces between Robb and Myrcella. It's mostly Robb but Myrcella is in the middle! I hope you enjoy

“So then,” Sansa laughs, “Rickon straightens up, looks Jon right in the face and says, _Jon, I’m glad you’re here._ ”

“After puking on your shoes?” Robb clarified.

“Yeah, he actually dry-heaved during the sentence but he still really pulled it off,” Jon noted in bewilderment.

Robb chuckled, missing his younger brother terribly. His football schedule hadn’t allowed him to come on this visit and Robb was sure that tonight he was up to no good with his teammates, in spite of their game the next day. At seventeen he was, according to Jon and Sansa, always up to no good.

As Jon and Sansa lived in the same town as him, they were the recipients of the drunken calls his Dad didn’t get, and had been regaling tales of his debauchery. To be honest, he was sounding more and more like Theon with every story.

“If you think _that’s_ bad,” Uncle Brynden cut in and pointed at him, “You should hear what he got up to the summer he was interning with us.”

“Tell meeee,” Sansa pleaded, gripping his forearm with both hands.

To say that Sansa was Uncle Brynden’s favorite was like suggesting the sun had a habit of rising in the east. Every inch Catelyn Tully’s, his little Cat’s, daughter, she was the only one to whom he was never gruff.

“Well,” Uncle Brynden started, his eyes sparkling.

“Daddy!” Wes called from the other room.

“HA!” Robb stood up, pointing at Brynden and then turned to Sansa, “And HA!”

“We can still talk about you while you’re not in the room,” Sansa pointed out.

Jon nodded, “Yeah, mate, you better leave actually…”

Robb chuckled and left the dining room and went into the living room where he found his son and niece, sitting on the couch. Not for the first time, he wondered about the old saying _The Starks endure._ Looking at his and his sister’s children, it wasn’t immediately obvious that was the case. Both had inherited the lion’s share of their features from their other parents. Wes with his mop of brown hair and his ever so slightly upturned nose, Lya with her wild black curls and the way she almost looked like she was pouting any time her face was resting. The only feature they’d both inherited from him and Sansa was their eyes, and those weren’t Stark eyes, they were Tully eyes.

It was there though, the Stark blood. Even if it couldn’t be seen, it could be felt. In their loyalty, their sense of right and wrong. Even at the ages of four and five, their moral compasses pointed due north.

“What’s up, honey?” he asked.

“Grey Wind did it again,” Wes explained, offering him the remote.

Robb looked at the television and as Wes had said, it was definitely speaking in another language. Somehow, no matter what, anytime Grey Wind got near their remote he pressed a button that did this.

“Silly Grey Wind,” Robb noted.

“Silly Grey Wind!” Lya agreed with her infectious giggle.

He went and sat on the couch next to her, taking the remote from Wes and trying to remember how to fix it. He tried not to dwell on the fact that his dog was more technologically adept than he was and started pressing buttons.

Lya crawled into his lap, her curls tickling his cheek as she bunched his shirt in her hands. He stroked her hair and kept pressing buttons until all of a sudden they could hear the common tongue again.

“Oh this is a good episode,” he noted.

“Yeah,” Lya yawned, burrowing into him deeper.

He could hear laughter in the next room, there was always laughter when Uncle Brynden was around, particularly if his sister was too, but Wes curled up at his side. Robb draped his arm around his son’s shoulder as he leaned against his chest. He put his feet up on the coffee table and settled back against the couch, watching as the dragons and their people tried to come up with a plan that would ultimately fail.

They’d been having a wonderful time since they’d arrived last night. It was always great when they came, and terrible when they left. They’d had pizza last night and then today had been a rare, beautiful day, so they had spent the whole of it outside. The kids had run around for hours and then fallen into deep sleeps around naptime as he and Jon and Sansa caught up on all the family business. Sansa was expecting again, which he’d known since the summer, but she was starting to show.

He couldn’t wait for another niece or a nephew. Lya brought him so much joy. Every so often he’d open the mail and in it would be a drawing she’d sent or a letter that she’d written. Sometimes they even were sent to his office and he’d be going through the daily drudgery and then he’d see Sansa’s elegant handwriting on the outside of an envelope.

It was funny, the way that kids differed. Lya was far more outgoing when it came to kids their age, but Wes was further along in other ways. Lya was still using a bike with training wheels, so when Wes had biked today she’d ridden along next to him on her little scooter. She also was more resistant to new foods, much to Sansa’s chagrin. But then verbally she might as well be seven or eight, and even occasionally seventeen from the way she spoke.

He and Sansa had learned when they were both babies not to judge their progress off of one another. Wes walked earlier, Lya spoke earlier. This one did this the other did that.

Robb was in no rush to get back into the dining room, wanting to give Jon and Sansa time with Uncle Brynden. He saw him every day but they only saw him when they came here, he hated to leave Riverrun.

After another episode they came back in and Sansa nudged Jon. Robb looked at them and Sansa made a _sleeping_ motion towards Lya. He had felt her slump against him more fully a few minutes prior. Uncle Brynden said his goodbyes, promising Sansa and Jon that he’d see them on Monday before they left and promising him that he was alright to drive.

They brought the kids up and tucked them into their beds and then went back downstairs and Jon grabbed another beer out for them as he made Sansa some tea.

“So what time are we meeting them tomorrow?” Sansa asked as they settled back onto the couches.

“10,” he answered.

“What’s the Mom like?” Jon asked.

“She’s great,” Robb sipped his beer. Then looked at Sansa, “Try not to marry off Lya and Cole. He’s a vicious flirt.”

She laughed, “Sounds like him and Lya are well-matched then. But I promise not to.” Jon looked at her and she shrugged, “Well I at least promise not to make it obvious.”

Jon chuckled as he sipped his beer, pulling her against him, his hand resting on her stomach. Robb felt his stomach clench in that pleasant, painful way it always did when he saw them together.

“How’s Dad doing?” he asked.

“He’s good,” Jon answered for them both, “Stubborn, but good.”

“Rickon isn’t giving him too much trouble?” Robb wondered.

“No, he gives that to Sansa,” Jon noted and Sansa rolled her eyes, sipping her tea. “But no, I mean, so what if he parties? His grades are better than ours were –“

“Speak for yourself,” Sansa cut in and Robb smirked.

“As I was saying, his grades are better than the two male dummies in this room,” Jon went on, “And the top three schools are in a bidding war for him. If he wants to blow off some steam on the weekends…”

“Yeah,” Robb agreed.

He, Jon and Theon had gotten up to their own share of trouble in high school, and though he’d never managed to throw up on his Dad’s shoes, there had definitely been a few drunken calls for a ride home early in the morning.

“Speaking of hot air,” Sansa said, “Are we seeing Theon tomorrow too?”

Robb chuckled, “Yeah he’ll come over to watch the game and stay for dinner.”

“Which you’re _sure_ you want to cook?” Sansa asked yet again.

“I’m grilling,” he reminded her, “It’ll be fine… Lya can supervise.”

The air felt warmer when they were there. He and Wes loved having company, the house sometimes seeming too large when it was just them, but there was nothing like when Jon and Sansa came to stay.

As though they felt it too, they all stayed up later than they should and parted with _sleep wells_ and _see you in the mornings_. He fell into a deep, dreamless sleep that allowed him to wake the next morning without that now familiar stomach churning.

The house was a hive of activity in the morning, and Jon and Sansa being there meant that he could take Grey Wind for a long, outdoor run. By the time he’d gotten back, his superhuman sister had fed and clothed Wes, and before too long it was time to head to the Harvest Festival.

Traffic was a bit of a nightmare, as people from all over the region came for it, but they’d thought ahead and decided to park a ways away and had a little wagon for the kids in case they got tired.

“Okay, my love, what are we _not_ going to do?” Jon asked Lya as he gave his daughter a piggy-back ride.

“Ummmmm eat flies?” Lya guessed.

“In addition to not eating flies,” Jon agreed.

“Throw rocks?” Lya ventured.

“In addition to not eating flies and not throwing rocks,” Jon agreed, clearly trying not to smile.

“What if-“

“Lya,” Jon said more firmly.

“We aren’t going to wander,” Lya grumbled.

“That’s right,” Robb agreed at Wes, though that wasn’t really fair because Wes never did.

Wes wasn’t paying attention enough to much care though, holding his hand tightly as he looked around. It was a bit of a scene, though a nice one. It wasn’t as cheesy as some of the things closer to Halloween could be, and they had lots of local vendors from all over the region who came to sell their specialties along with hayrides and bobbing for apples and all the rest.

It wasn’t as clear a day as the day before but it looked like the rain would hold. Even still, in the wagon he was pulling there was full rain gear for the kids.

“Wesssssssssssss,” they all heard.

“COLE!” Wes called back.

As soon as Robb spotted Cole and Ella he released Wes’ hand to allow his son to sprint over to them. Cole and Wes hugged, jumping up and down excitedly, talking over one another.

“Holy shit,” Jon said at his side.

“What?” Robb wondered.

Jon looked at him for a minute and Robb looked back, not even trying to keep the confusion from his face and Jon shook his head, “Nothing.”

“Okay,” Robb agreed, “Come on.”

Wes had finished greeting Cole and was telling Ella something excitedly. She was crouched down to speak to him and nodding excitedly at whatever he was saying.

“ROBBBBBBBB,” Cole announced as he got near.

“Put ‘em up, put ‘em up,” Robb urged and Cole made two little fists, hitting them against his extended palms. He shook his hand, “Oof you’re getting too strong.”

“I’ve been _practicing_ ,” Cole informed him.

“Attaboy,” Robb agreed, his hand cupping his head, “Want to meet some friends of mine?”

To his surprise, Cole wrapped his arm around his leg, stepping slightly behind him and Robb placed his hand on his shoulder. Jon must have seen it too because he leaned down.

“Hey Cole, I’m Jon,” he greeted him, making himself as small as possible, “I hear you are _the coolest kid ever_.”

Cole grinned an adorable smile and looked up at him as though looking for confirmation. Robb squeezed his shoulder and Cole gave Jon the high-five he had held his hand out for.

Robb turned to Ella who was now holding Wes and looking at something he was pointing to in the distance.

“Hey Ella,” he said and she turned to him with a bright smile.

“Sorry, we were _planning our attack_ , weren’t we?” she asked Wes.

“YEAH!” Wes agreed, “Ella’s gonna paint a pumpkin.”

“They have pumpkin painting???” Lya asked excitedly. “Mommy can I do it too?”

“Of course you can,” Sansa agreed and then looked at Ella, “Hi, I’m Robb’s sister Sansa.”

“Myrcella Martell,” Ella stepped forward, still holding Wes to shake her hand, “I’ve heard the loveliest things about you.” And then looked at Lya and smiled, “And _you_.”

“What about me?” Jon asked.

Ella looked at him and cocked her head to the side, “Hmm… nope. Not a thing.” She then grinned, “I’m kidding, of course. It’s nice to meet you Jon.”

“Yeah,” Jon nodded, shaking her hand, “Yeah, it’s really nice to meet you too, Ella.”

Ella let Wes down and he proudly watched as Wes introduced Cole and Lya. Manners were something they were still working on but Wes was so excited to introduce the two that it sort of came out as excited yelling giggles. Cole and Lya seemed to speak whatever language he was though.

“So where to first?” Sansa asked.

“Ooooh pumpkin painting! No face painting! Carousel! No! Hayride!” Cole suggested rapid fire.

Ella looked at him and Jon, “We’re a _little_ excited.” Then turned to Cole and said, “We’ll do it all baby, but let’s see what everyone else wants to do.”

“Hayride!” Lya said to which Wes replied, “Hayride!”

The ayes had it so they all made their way over. There was a bit of a line but the kids didn’t seem to mind, they were talking rapid fire so he decided to follow Wes’ lead and bridge the adults.

When he turned to do so though he found that Ella and Sansa were already talking, and Robb looked at Jon.

“What are they talking about?” he asked.

“I have no idea,” Jon shrugged, looking helpless, “One of them said something and now… I _think_ it’s about a book. But. I really can’t be sure.”

***

Within a minute and a half of meeting Sansa Snow, Myrcella was no longer surprised that Robb and Wes were so kind.

His younger sister was loveliness itself. She had a calmness to her that suggested wild younger siblings. She knew that she was the oldest girl and knew from her own life what that brought along with it.

Wes was enamored with his aunt, and his cousin Lya, a five-year-old with a spirit to her that Myrcella couldn’t locate in either of her parents. Perhaps theirs had just been tempered, or maybe she had inherited it from someone else in her family line.

Cole had taken to Lya immediately as Robb had promised he would, and the three kids had sat huddled together on the hayride, pointing at different things and speaking rapidly.

They’d done half a dozen other things, and Jon and Robb had taken the boys off at one point when Lya insisted on painting pumpkins. The little girl had requested she stay along and Myrcella didn’t have it in her heart to deny her. She knew she could trust Robb with Cole, even in these crowds, and it was calming to sit there painting a pumpkin, talking with Sansa about a hundred little nothings.

When they had completed their pumpkins, they walked over to meet the guys in the face painting line.

“I wanted to thank you, by the way,” Sansa said to her.

“For what?” Myrcella wondered.

“For… I don’t know,” Sansa smiled and looked at her, “I just feel like I should thank you. There’s been such a change in Wes, and Robb… I mean the way Robb feels about how Wes is doing. I’m not describing it right but…”

Myrcella smiled, “I know that Cole is Wes’ first real friend. But honestly Wes is Cole’s too. He has _playmates_ , boys in his class that he can play with, but he and Wes are… friends. Real friends.”

Sansa nodded, “They remind me a bit of Jon and Robb, actually.”

“Really?” Myrcella wondered, feeling a warmth flood her body. The idea that Cole could have found a lifelong friend hit her with an overwhelming sense of _something_. “That would be so nice. I think Wes is spectacular.”

“He is, isn’t he?” Sansa asked, “I always thought I was biased because I’m his auntie but, he really is. And my goodness he _loooves_ you.”

As though to prove her point, Wes spotted them and shouted, “Auntie Sansa Ella Lyaaaa come hereeeee.”

The three of them joined up to where Jon and Robb were in line with the boys and to her surprise Cole was saying something to Jon who was nodding earnestly, really listening the way Robb always seemed to when one of the boys spoke.

“Look Ella,” Wes took her hand and brought her to the board where you could look at the different designs that could be done. He pointed up to it, “A butterfly! Like the one at the museum.”

She grinned, “Do you think I should get it?”

“Yeah!” Wes agreed, “We alllll think so.”

She turned to look back and saw Robb, Cole and Jon standing as a united front, “Is that so?”

“It was Daddy’s idea,” Wes informed her.

Robb’s mouth dropped open as though that had been a secret and she couldn’t help but laugh. She hadn’t really planned on getting her face painted, mostly because she didn’t want to make anyone wait any longer while she did, but if it meant that much to all of them, she didn’t mind it either.

They rejoined the group and she peered at Robb, “And what are _you_ getting painted on _your_ face?”

“Oh, I don’t do face paint,” Robb shook his head, avoiding her eyes, “I’m allergic.”

“You’re such a bad liar,” she scoffed. “Truly terrible.”

“Once again you say it like a character flaw,” he chuckled.

“It is pretty shocking how bad you are at it,” Sansa pointed out. Jon went to say something, but Sansa looked at him, “Don’t even try it. You’re as miserable as he is.”

Jon acted horrified and she and Sansa started musing the different things they could get painted on Robb and Jon’s cheeks. Cole and Wes were going to get dragons and Lya was going to get her entire face painted as a cat.

The line wasn’t too bad, and they passed the time easily with a hundred separate conversations. She spoke to Jon a little bit, who was quieter than Robb and Sansa though no less kind. He told her that he’d grown up with the Starks, his Mom had been best friends with Robb and Sansa’s Uncle Benjen, and had always been close with their Dad. It sounded like all of their memories were shared, like there had never been a time when he hadn’t known them.

After everyone had their faces painted to their desired levels (the kids entirely, her and Sansa on one cheek, and Jon and Robb not at all) they went and grabbed lunch. There was no real seating plan, everyone just landed wherever, and she was only a little surprised that she ended up next to Wes, who had Sansa on his other side.

It was hardly a nutritious lunch, the Harvest Festival wasn’t known for its healthy offerings, but everyone was very happy with their fried this or that.

“Oh,” Sansa said as they finished up their meals.

Ella turned to look at her but she was looking at Robb, who had Cole slumped against his arm. She couldn’t help but smile, her son could fall asleep anywhere and no amount of excitement would get in the way of his desire for his weekend naps. That had been the hardest adjustment for him to kindergarten, their rest time in the middle of the day wasn’t quite long enough for him.

Robb glanced down at Cole as though just noticing he’d fallen asleep against him and then looked at her, “You win.”

She laughed, “It was a team effort. But I should get him home.” She stood up, feeling surprisingly disappointed to be leaving them all. It was just so cozy with them, warm, but she knew that they probably wanted to get back to their family time as well. “It was so nice to meet you all, thank you for letting us tag along.”

Sansa got up too and they kissed each other’s cheeks, “We’ll have to get together the next time I’m here, alright?”

“I’d love that,” Myrcella told her honestly and then turned to her daughter, “And you, the lovely Miss Lya. I want you to have so much fun this weekend, okay?”

“Promise!” Lya agreed, tugging her hand.

Myrcella bent over and the little girl planted a quick kiss on the butterfly on her cheek.

She looked at Jon and smiled, “It was really nice meeting you.”

Jon nodded, “Yeah Ella, it was… it was really great meeting you too. I hope we see each other again soon.”

She smiled at him and turned to Wes, “I’ll see you on Tuesday morning, sweetheart.”

“Bye Ella,” Wes said, hugging her waist.

She stroked her hand through his soft brown hair, hugging him back before walking around the table to get Cole.

To her surprise, Robb stood up from the table, setting Cole into his arms. Cole’s head fell against his shoulder, not in the last bit aware that he’d changed altitudes.

“Thanks,” she reached out for him.

“Let me walk you to your car,” Robb said and then laughed, “You’re right, we _do_ always do that.”

“Oh we’re just in the parking lot up there,” she demurred, not wanting him to feel like he had to.

He nodded and turned to Sansa and Jon, “I’ll meet you guys at the car in a few?”

Jon cleared his throat, “Sure, see you there.”

She waved at them and they waved back and she turned away from the table. Robb fell into step beside her and she had to admit her arms were very grateful to him.

“Thanks for coming today,” Robb said as they made their way through the crowd.

“Thanks for letting us crash,” she corrected, “Your family is really wonderful, Robb.”

“Yeah,” he nodded, “They are. But I’m happy they met you guys. I think it gives Sansa some comfort.”

“She worries about you, huh?” she asked.

“Yeah, it’s in her nature,” he explained, then looked at her, “Not that you should feel like you _have_ to –“

“Robb,” she interrupted gently. “We both love spending time with you guys. In case it’s not obvious,” she gestured to where Cole had burrowed into Robb’s neck.

“Do uh…,” Robb started, “Your siblings get that way?”

“Yeah,” she promised, “Mostly my sisters-in-law to be honest, but my cousin and my older brother Gendry and my younger brother… They all worry. I wish they didn’t it sort of makes me feel… I don’t know.”

“Inadequate?” Robb wondered.

She turned to look at him and found him looking at her already, “Yeah,” she admitted. “Like I’m… failing Cole in some way.”

“I don’t believe that,” Robb argued gently, “No one who has seen you two together could think that.”

It was obvious that he meant it, so she didn’t want to dismiss it, even if she didn’t agree, so she merely said, “Or you with Wes.”

“I called that doctor,” he told her, “I’ve got a session on Friday.”

“That’s great, Robb,” she told him, then wondered, “Do you promise we can still be friends if it is terrible?”

“Let’s see _how_ terrible,” he teased, and she agreed. He looked at her and shook his head, “But uh, yeah, Ella. You’re not going to be able to shake me, now. We Starks are stubborn beasts.”

She laughed, and told him honestly, a full sentence, “Good.”

They got to her car and she opened up the back door and Robb eased Cole into his seat. She buckled him in and closed the door.

Robb opened her door for her and she turned to him, “Enjoy the rest of your time with them.”

“Yeah, I’ll see you Tuesday morning,” he nodded.

“Okay,” she agreed then realized she was standing there awkwardly and let out a laugh as she got into her car, “Bye Robb.”

“Bye Ella,” he said as she got settled into her seat.

She went to go close the door, but his hand was holding it open.

“Robb?” she asked.

“Yeah?” he asked.

“The door…” she pointed.

“Oh, yeah!” he laughed at himself but before he released it, he asked, “You okay to drive?”

She was used to him asking that by now but she nodded and told him earnestly as always, “Yeah. Promise.”

He took her at her word and walked away purposefully, not looking back.

It was a good thing, too, because it took another few minutes for her hands to stop shaking enough for her not to be a liar.

***

“Do you want some tea?” Sansa asked him and Jon after they got the kids settled in for their naps.

“No I need some more coffee,” Jon noted, rubbing his face.

“I’ll put on a pot,” Robb agreed.

They busied themselves with those tasks and Jon went into the fridge and grabbed out the leftover bowl of fruit from dinner the night before and they started picking at it.

“What time is the game? 4?” Sansa asked.

“Yeah,” Jon agreed, “Theon’ll be here before then though, right?”

“Should be, but who knows?” Robb noted.

Theon, for all his wonderful attributes, which even Jon would admit he had, had never been good at timing. He imagined that today would inspire more promptness than usual though, with Jon and Sansa here. Sansa mostly, but Jon didn’t have to know that.

“So,” Sansa said, “Do you think Ella will notice if I steal Cole?”

Robb chuckled, “Get in line.”

“You might want to put a leash on Wes, now that I think about it,” Jon noted, “With her around.”

“Yeah, he’d follow her without once looking back,” Robb agreed.

“Is he…,” Sansa started, and he looked at her, “The only one?”

“What?” Robb asked.

“Sansa,” Jon shook his head.

“Like you weren’t thinking it?” Sansa asked him.

“Thinking and saying are two very different things,” Jon pointed out.

Robb waved at them, “Hello? What are you guys talking about?”

“Robb,” Sansa chided, “Come on.”

He looked at her and Jon said, “Man. Come on.”

“Can one of you please say something resembling an actual sentence?” he asked.

Sansa and Jon seemed to confer with their eyes and suddenly Robb knew exactly where this was going and he would do anything he could to stop it, but he knew there was nothing that could.

“We’re friends,” he tried anyway.

“And I think that’s great,” Sansa agreed. Her face softening, “But if it was more than that… that would also be great.”

“Come on Sansa,” he pleaded, “When I told you not to marry off Cole and Lya I didn’t mean that you _should_ marry off me and Ella.”

“She’s not crazy for thinking it,” Jon defended her. “I mean, honestly. Have you seen her?”

“Jon!” Sansa smacked him.

“I was looking _for him_ ,” Jon argued.

“Oh you were looking at her ass _for him,_ then?” Sansa asked crossing her arms.

“I’m…,” Jon shook his head, “A _very_ good friend.”

Robb chuckled, less because he thought it was funny and more because he was hoping that would convince them to leave it there. He had no desire to talk about this. There was nothing to talk about for that matter.

Sansa wasn’t going to let it go though, “Robb it’s… it’s been three years.”

“No.” He argued, “It hasn’t.”

“Okay it’s _almost_ been three years,” Jon agreed, “And we’re not saying that you should suddenly be over it but… Jeyne wouldn’t want you to be alone forever.”

“How do you know?” Robb asked. “Did you ask her? Did she leave some instructions behind that you haven’t told me about?”

“Robb, please don’t be angry,” Sansa asked softly. “We just want you to be happy.”

“For fuck’s sake, _Wes_ is finally happy, he finally has a friend, someone outside of this family that he adores. _Two people_ in fact. And you want me to ruin it because she has a nice ass?” he wondered.

“So,” Jon nodded, “You noticed it too.”

“Hit him, please,” Robb lamented, pushing away from the counter.

“Robby,” Sansa said gently. “I understand that this might be difficult for you.”

“Oh, you do?” he asked petulantly. “Because actually my life had gotten a whole hell of a lot _easier_ since they came into it until this conversation.”

“Can I just point out one thing?” Jon asked. “Without you biting my head off, or your sister’s who, I would remind you, is currently carrying your niece or nephew and should _not be under any stress at all_?”

The mention of his sister’s condition tempered him a little and he nodded.

“Do you think this would be your reaction if we were entirely off base?” Jon asked.

“Jeyne was the love of my life,” he told them pitifully.

“Jeyne,” Sansa tested saying her name and he kept his face calm, “Was… a great, _great_ love. And there is nothing that will ever change that. We loved her, you know that we did. And if I could give you one thing in this world it would be putting her back by your side. But I _can’t do that_ , Robby. I can’t do it and you have no idea how sorry I am about that. But if I could do one thing for _her_? It would be to help you find a way to be happy. And I _can_ do that. We can do that. So I owe it to her to try.”

This was why he never argued with Sansa. She was brilliant at it.

“I know your heart is in the right place,” he admitted, because theirs always were. “But we have just gotten to a good place and I’m not ready. I know it’d be better for everyone else if I was, but I’m not. Jeyne is … I know that she’s gone, but she isn’t for me. I think about her and I dream about her and I’m not ready to let her go.”

“I thought the dreams stopped,” Sansa said.

“They came back,” he admitted, realizing he hadn’t told her that.

“When?” Jon asked. Robb’s jaw clenched and Jon shook his head, raising his eyebrows slightly, “When?”

“I’m not ready,” he repeated, ignoring Jon’s question because they all knew the answer. “And neither is she, by the way.”

“Okay,” Sansa nodded. “I’m sorry we brought it up. You’re just… very sweet together. But if you say it’s just friends then I’ll respect that.”

“Thank you,” he nodded, going into the cupboard and grabbing out two mugs and sliding them towards them. “Look uh… can you guys listen for the kids I need some air.”

“Robb,” Jon sighed.

“I’m fine, we’re fine,” he promised, “I just… need some air.”

They nodded at him, and he walked away purposefully, not looking back. They didn’t try to stop him as he went outside. 

It was a good thing, too, because it took more than a few minutes for him to calm down enough for him not to be a liar.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> ruh roh! 
> 
> I'd love to hear what you all think


	7. Chapter 7

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> So apologies in advance, this chapter is much shorter than the rest and it is all from Robb's perspective. I kept it brief because I didn't feel like doing what felt like was going to be "filler" from Myrcella's POV.
> 
> I hope you enjoy! Thanks so much for all of your kind words, it makes writing this SO much more fun.

“But what am _I_ going to do?” Wes asked.

“We can still _pick_ the apples,” Robb noted, then glanced briefly in the rearview mirror as he stopped at a red light and winced when he saw Wes’ disappointed face. “I know it’s not the best honey, but you’ll still be with your friends and outside _all_ day. That’s pretty cool, right?”

“But Will said even the _doughnuts_ are apple,” Wes grumbled. “He went and he said EVERYTHING is apple.”

He refused to find his son’s dramatics funny. His son was upset, and it was _not_ funny. The fact that his son was giving a performance worthy of Hamlet in regard to apple picking was absolutely not funny.

Wes being allergic to apples was rarely an issue. They kept different kinds of juice in the house and it wasn’t the sort of thing that was in a lot of different foods, so it was pretty easy to avoid. Most importantly, the allergy thankfully wasn’t life threatening so he didn’t have to constantly carry an epi-pen and had never gotten a petrified call from school.

His family was well aware so even though Sansa made an apple pie for Thanksgiving every year, she also made things Wes could eat.

So it was really just today, as the class field trip was to an orchard to go apple picking, that it had become an obstacle to his happiness.

It was one of the reasons Robb had wanted to be a chaperone in the first place, he didn’t want Wes to be bummed all day. So far, he had not been doing great at stopping that.

“They have other stuff,” he promised, “I looked it up and everything.”

“You did?” Wes’ voice perked.

“Yeah, they have pumpkins, maybe we should get some to decorate this weekend, what do you say?” Robb asked as he pulled into the school’s parking lot.

“Yeaaaah,” Wes agreed. “I want a BIG one and we can carve Grey Wind in it.”

“Um,” Robb stalled.

“Oh oooh no! Toothless,” Wes went on. “And yours can be Hiccup!”

It usually filled him with great pride that Wes thought he could do anything. On occasions such as this one though, it got him into precarious situations where he was out of his depth and would have to find a way to fudge it.

Jeyne had always loved carving pumpkins. Their first year as a couple she had made him do it and he’d grumbled about how cheesy it was to go pumpkin picking with her in her brown boots and white sweater and him in his flannel, but he’d gone along and taken the pictures, one of which was still on his desk at work. She’d been somewhat troublingly good at carving; it had been a better warning than any that either of her brothers had tried to give him and had created amazing designs. The first year they’d moved into their house she had all but etched its likeness into the surface of a pumpkin.

“Good thought, good thought,” Robb agreed, “Or… have you considered something that _almost_ looks like a face if you squint _reaaaaally_ hard.”

Wes giggled as he pulled into a parking spot and he got them out of the car. Rather than go to Wes’ classroom they walked around the side of the building where there was a big yellow school bus. They were early, as requested, and he made sure Wes didn’t need to use the bathroom before he went over to Mr. Tarly.

“Good morning Wes!” Mr. Tarly greeted his son and then looked somewhere past his shoulder, “And hello Robb.”

“Good morning,” he and Wes chorused.

Mr. Tarly had been really weird with him lately. He’d promised that it had nothing to do with Wes’ behavior in school, but Robb couldn’t help but be concerned that something had happened. Or worse yet that something had happened at home that Robb somehow didn’t know about and that Wes had told him.

Whatever it was, and he understood that it could be nothing, they weren’t going to be able to talk about it in front of Wes.

“So what do you need me to do?” he asked him.

“Well not much until we get there,” Mr. Tarly admitted, “I’ll count everyone off when we’re on the bus and give them the number of their group. It’ll be five kids per adult, here is your list.”

Robb took it and was pleased to see that Will Bracken was in their group. Cole wasn’t because Ella was also chaperoning, but he was hearing more and more about Will lately, so at least Wes would have one friend with them. There were two girls, Celia Darry and Sophie Grey, and another boy named Hunter Deddings. He didn’t really know much about them, but he vaguely knew their parents, or at least their extended families.

“Will’s in our group,” he told Wes.

“Yes!” Wes celebrated, “Who else?” Robb read him the names and Wes asked, “Sophie?”

“Yeah, Sophie Grey,” Robb nodded, wondering if the little girl wasn’t nice.

His son merely nodded though and then one of the other parents who was chaperoning arrived.

“Hi, I’m Natalie Hawick,” she greeted him.

“Robb Stark,” he offered his hand.

Wes waved hello to her daughter, Jenny, who waved back and he made a few minutes of small talk with Natalie. Or rather, he asked her one question and she filled the silence for the next few minutes.

He was relieved when Wes called, “COLE!”

“Wesssssrobbbbbb,” Cole called back.

He excused them from Natalie and her daughter, and he followed Wes as he went to greet Cole and Ella.

“Good morning Stark men,” Ella smiled, stroking Wes’ hair as he hugged her around her knees.

Cole was a welcome distraction as he came over and hooked both of his little arms around one of his. Robb lifted him, making a lot of strained, grunting noises until Cole’s little face was right in front of his.

“Hi!” Cole grinned.

“Oh _hello_ ,” he smiled back, lowering Cole back to the ground.

Cole and Wes started talking to each other and there was very little else to do except say hello to Ella. Ever since Sunday he had been trying his hardest not to be awkward around her. She didn’t deserve it and he didn’t want his discomfort to extend to her.

He’d admit to himself, if no one else, that Jon and Sansa bringing the possibility of the two of them up was not the first time that he’d thought about it. It was something he actively tried not to think about, wrong for so many reasons, but it found its way in, nonetheless.

The truth was, they were right. She was an undeniable beauty, which in and of itself wasn’t hard to admit. It was obvious to everyone and he wasn’t going to berate himself for not being blind.

The rest of it though was the part that was harder to forgive himself for. He found too much pleasure in her company, he’d known that since the Science Museum. That night he’d hardly been able to close his eyes without thinking of that damn butterfly landing on her elegant fingertip or her girlish giggle when he offered to teach her how to throw a baseball.

There were so many reasons not to pursue something though. Not the least of which was that he wasn’t even entirely sure that he wanted to. He knew he wasn’t ready, how often he was thinking and dreaming of Jeyne was proof of that, and most importantly there was Wes.

He wasn’t sure that he’d ever want to be with anyone again, but if he did eventually, he wouldn’t introduce her to his son until he was sure that it was something real and lasting. Wes already knew Ella and loved her.

He’d thought at first that his son just had an innocent crush on her, which wouldn’t have been wholly surprising, but it went deeper than that. He trusted her.

Which brought him back around to trying to be normal with Ella, because if he didn’t want Wes to lose her by trying to pursue something with her, he certainly didn’t want him to lose her because he couldn’t find a way to keep her in the box he’d created for her, and that Sansa and Jon had torn open.

“I’m going to pick _so_ many apples,” she informed him.

“Aren’t they always kind of mealy?” he asked.

“Yeah,” she grinned, “Usually. I make a cake with them. But Cole won’t eat it, so I’ll bring it to the _ladies_.”

She’d told him about the ladies at drop-off one morning. Usually she was wearing jeans and something woefully unprepared for the weather outside but that day she’d been in a dress and heels and had explained that she had a meeting for one of the charities she worked with. She’d told him all about the _ladies_ , the doyennes of society that she wrangled into focusing on the actual purpose of their being there. She always spoke of them with a sort of dismissive affection, and he wondered if she wasn’t just a little self-conscious, thinking he’d think she was some flighty socialite who planned parties all day.

He didn’t, but it was easier to pester her with questions about the ladies than assure her of that.

“So what do we have to do?” she asked him, waving at Natalie who was speaking with Mr. Tarly.

He explained the list she was going to get and what Mr. Tarly had told him so far and then the last chaperone arrived, a woman who waved briefly at them before going right over to Natalie and huddling in conversation.

The other kids in Wes’ class started to arrive and Ella nudged him excitedly when his son stood with a group of kids even though Cole was with others. She left at one point to grab her list from Mr. Tarly and he spoke to a few parents who all shared that they wished _they_ were going apple picking rather than whatever else they were doing. Robb didn’t note that they could have signed up to be chaperones just as easily as he had and none of them seemed terribly disappointed to be waving goodbye to their children for the day.

Mr. Tarly ushered all the kids onto the bus, and Wes waved to him excitedly, his self-pity gone entirely, as he and Cole climbed on together.

“Be my bus buddy?” Ella asked with a toothy grin.

Robb decided to banish his own self-pity as well. There were far worse things than being friends with a beautiful, kind woman. 

So he grinned back and said, “I thought you’d never ask.”

The other two chaperones were already seated in their own row and Ella slid into an empty one and he sat down beside her in the aisle seat.

They waited as Mr. Tarly did his checks and then came and sat down in front of them. The bus pulled away and the chatter of the children was bouncing off the walls of the bus.

“Do you have a good group?” he asked her.

“Of course, Robb, all children are wonderful,” she agreed loudly and then whispered, “Though I’ve got one or two exceptions in my group.”

He chuckled, and handed her his paper, “What do you know about this bunch?”

“Ooh Sophie Grey, _big_ get,” she said as she looked at the paper. He looked at her and she rolled her eyes, “She’s the Queen of kindergarten.” She must have seen something on his face because she shook her head, “And _sweet as sugar_. She came over for a playdate a week or so ago. That one is all about her pleases and thank yous and I swear Cole’s room was _cleaner_ when she left.”

He chuckled and she showed him her list. She really had gotten a few bad apples, and she winced appropriately when he made that terrible joke.

“So Robb,” she narrowed her eyes at him as the bus got onto the highway. “Were you a back of the bus kind of kid?”

“I’m _offended_ ,” he told her, “And _shocked_ ,” he went on, “And _how can you tell?_ ”

She giggled, “I have a sense for these things… Were you the kid making out on the way home from the seventh-grade camping trip?”

“No,” he promised, “That was Theon… I did my making out _on_ the seventh-grade camping trip.”

“Bonfire?” she asked.

“Tent, actually,” he grimaced.

A surprised smile overtook her face and she shook her head, “Quite the rebel. You’re bad for my reputation, you know that?”

“Smarty pants, front of the class, offering to help the teacher,” he guessed.

Her face flushed, “Do you have pictures too?”

“Not yet, still in a bidding war for them,” he teased, which he realized after he said it could seem horribly creepy but she laughed, so he decided not to push it further and admitted, “But no you just have that vibe to you.”

“Type-A, control freak?” she guessed.

He shook his head, explaining, “Just good.”

She smiled and then looked around, as though to determine whether anyone was listening to their conversation.

“I did sit in the back row once,” she confessed.

He leaned forward, “Spill.”

“Everyone was playing Truth or Dare,” she told him excitedly, and then deadpanned, “I was reading Sense and Sensibility.”

He chuckled, “Yeah, that figures. There was always one girl who everyone _wanted_ to play, but never did.”

For his class it had been Alys Karstark. She’d had a severe, northern sort of prettiness that hadn’t shown itself until late into middle school, after a few unfortunate years of being teased for her gangliness. The summer before eighth grade though, as though someone somewhere thought they all needed to be taught a lesson, all of her features stopped competing with one another and fell into perfect sympathy. Rightfully, she wouldn’t give any of those that had teased her the time of day, and though he and Jon never had she dismissed them just as thoroughly for the children they still were.

Though he couldn’t imagine that had been Ella’s story he could very easily imagine her being above it all from the start.

Her face scrunched, and he was worried that he’d made her uncomfortable but then she said, “Before I forget…”

Ella turned away then and reached into her handbag and pulled out a zip-lock one and handed it to him.

“I’m not sure if we’re doing things at different times, so I wanted to give these to you now for Wes,” she explained.

He looked at the plastic bag and saw that there were ten homemade cookies in it. They looked oddly familiar, and he was hit with a strange sense of something he couldn’t really place, except that it made his stomach churn.

“You baked him cookies?” he asked.

She nodded and explained, “I figured the doughnuts and other stuff would be with apples and I didn’t want him to not have something to snack on when the other kids were.”

“So, you baked him cookies?” he repeated, looking down at the bag.

“Well this day has to be a bit of a bust for him,” she lamented and then smiled kindly, “Except you being here of course.”

“Why are you so nice?” he asked.

He realized then why she’d said it like it was a character flaw. It was nearly an assault. There was so much time that he spent worrying that he wasn’t enough and here was her gently providing proof of that. He’d looked it up and he knew that there would also be pumpkin bread and late summer peach pie there, but he was his Dad. She had no reason to do something so kind, and yet she offered it as though it was obvious.

She narrowed her eyes and nudged her shoulder against his, “Why do you say that like it’s a character flaw?”

“No,” he shook his head, not dwelling on the fact that their minds had gone to the same place and told her sincerely, “I mean thank you. This is really sweet and just, above and beyond.”

“It was no trouble,” she waved her hand, “I just remembered he’d liked them.”

“Are these the ginger molasses ones?” he asked, wanting to focus on something other than her kind eyes.

“Yeah,” she confirmed.

He opened the bag and pulled one out and took a bite, “Oh myasdfjef.”

She laughed, and chided, “Those are for Wes! Don’t make me regret giving them to you.”

“Kids shouldn’t have too much sugar,” he reasoned before taking another bite. “These are _insane_.”

“Thank you,” she grinned. “Cole is so unsatisfying to bake for. I’ve started making my own potato chips just to get the desired reaction.”

“Salt tooth, huh?” he asked, welcoming the distraction of their children.

“Horrible one!” she agreed, “I once gave him chocolate covered pretzels and he looked at me like I’d destroyed everything he holds most dear.”

“You can uh, send those our way next time,” Robb confirmed, “Wes is all about the sweets.”

She agreed that all excess baked goods would be delivered promptly to them and they debated the merits of sweet and salty (chocolate + popcorn? Good for Ella, bad for him. Salted caramel? He loved it, she abhorred it) and talked about how they’d spent the rest of their weekends.

“So,” she noted quietly, “Big day tomorrow. Huh?”

He was unsurprised at this point that she remembered that his first session with his potential new therapist, Dr. Selmy, was tomorrow.

“I’m not worried,” he shook his head, “You shouldn’t worry.”

“Terrified?” she guessed, and he nodded.

“Any words of wisdom?” he asked.

She looked at him and he felt somewhat leveled by her gaze. It wasn’t that she was seeing through him though, it seemed more like she was trying to determine how much of herself to reveal.

“You’ll be better at it than me,” she told him to his surprise. It must have shown on his face because she reasoned, “You’re so much more open than I am.”

“Am I?” he wondered.

She nodded, “I think so. You seem it, anyway. Me on the other hand. Type-A, control freak.”

“Wanting to be in control doesn’t make you a freak,” he reasoned. “You just need to get comfortable. Was there ever a time when you didn’t feel that need? To be in control?”

“Yeah,” she nodded, and to his horror her voice was thick, but her face was a calm mask, “There was a time when I had absolutely no control at all.”

“How’d it feel?” he wondered.

A heartbreaking smile overtook her face, “Terrifying and brilliant.”

Somewhere in the distance he heard Jeyne’s bedroom laugh.

“Yeah,” he agreed. “Sounds about right.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> next ch will likely be all from Myrcella's POV but I haven't written it yet so WHO KNOWS


	8. Chapter 8

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> This chapter is all from Myrcella's perspective! I'm not sure if I'll go back to having them both in each chapter, it may go back and forth between the two. I don't want to feel like I'm adding filler just because of format, but I hope the deviation isn't too annoying.

“What are we thinking today?” Myrcella asked, “Smoothie? Eggs? Lobster ravioli?”

“Eggies,” Cole confirmed.

“Alright baby, you get dressed and I will go get those started,” Myrcella said and was about to leave the room but then turned back around, “And there will be an underwear inspection so let’s make sure those get put on.”

“Yes Mommy,” Cole smiled mischievously.

She had no idea _why_ Cole had developed a disdain for wearing underwear anywhere other than on top of his head, but he had. He assured her it wasn’t uncomfortable he just didn’t _like_ it, and every morning it was a bit of a _will-they-or-won’t-they_ between Cole and his undergarments.

Of all the things to rebel about, this was pretty harmless, but she was doing her best to establish boundaries now so that he’d understand them later if he was up to something less innocuous. He didn’t require a ton of discipline, his nature was a good one and for the most part he liked to follow the rules, as she always had. The rest, the bit of mischief, was something she didn’t want to rid him of entirely. He had come by that honestly, too.

Myrcella went down the back stairs that lead to the kitchen and scrambled some eggs, pulling out the creamy, garlic and herb cheese that Cole loved and a carton of blueberries. She rinsed those as the eggs cooked and then plopped some of the cheese in the pan, stirring it and letting it sit until the edges burned slightly the way Cole liked. She poured herself some iced coffee and grabbed a peach out of the fridge for her and by the time Cole came downstairs, she and breakfast were at the table.

“Look Mommy!” Cole said, pulling up his shirt and then tugging up the waistband of his underwear.

“Good boy,” she commended him and pulled out his chair.

Cole took big gulps of water before he started eating his eggs and he assessed her as he munched on them.

“What’s up, buttercup?” she asked.

“Can we play with Wes and Robb today?” he asked.

“No, baby,” Myrcella lamented and then smiled, “But we’re going to Sophie’s today!”

“Oh,” Cole smiled, “Cool. She has a bunny!”

“No. Way.” Myrcella gasped. “That is so cool, a _bunny_? Do you think it twitches its nose like this?” Cole watched her twitch her nose and nodded in agreement. “Let’s see your bunny twitch.” Cole attempted to twitch his nose but his whole face ended up moving. “Excellent.”

“Tomorrow?” he asked.

“Can we play with Wes and Robb?” she wondered, and Cole nodded. “I’ll ask at drop-off, okay? But we have plans with them on Saturday.”

“Yesssss,” Cole celebrated. “What are we doing?”

“I don’t know,” Myrcella realized, “Any suggestions?”

“Trampoline!” Cole said. “Dance party! Tacos!”

Myrcella laughed, “That honestly sounds like a great day. I’ll see if they’re on board.”

“Wes _LOVES_ tacos,” Cole informed her, “Like a dragon.”

There were very few things at this point that could not be traced back to one of two things: Wes or dragons. Dragons she knew would pass at some point, the way unicorns had when he was in preschool, but she had a sneaking suspicion that Wes wouldn’t. She certainly hoped he wouldn’t anyway, but ever since Sansa had mentioned them reminding her of Robb and Jon, she’d found herself thinking of it every so often.

Funnily, it was actually Cole who reminded her of Robb in that scenario. Wes, the quieter of the two, was a bit more like his uncle.

They all had that same kindness though, and she hoped that Cole would prove as loyal as either Jon or Robb. When it came to Wes, anyway. She wouldn’t mind if dragons went the way of the unicorn eventually.

“Wes has _such_ good taste,” she agreed, “Think he’ll eat the sweet potato kind?”

“Yeah,” Cole nodded, “He loves veguhtuhbles.”

“He do-uh-es?” she gasped, making Cole giggle as she stole a blueberry from his bowl. “Alright, baby, eat up. We have to leave in tennnn minutes.”

This was a good day and they made it out the door in eight, which gave them plenty of time to decide important things such as what to listen to (Abba) and whether the sunroof should be open (yes) without her only half-listening to him as she tried to focus on getting them there safe and sound.

When they arrived at the school, she and Cole made a run for it because it looked like the sky was going to open yet again. They got inside without ceremony though and waved to different parents and kids as they walked in. She smiled at Mr. Tarly as she got Cole settled and then let her son go greet his other friends.

She didn’t see Wes yet, so she knew Robb hadn’t come and gone, usually they arrived near to the same time anyway. She supposed she could call him that evening but the only thing she had scheduled for while Cole was at school was a trip to the grocery store and her appointment with Dr. Dayne at one o’clock, so she didn’t mind waiting around. She’d bring Cole over to Sophie’s that afternoon, as she wasn’t entirely sure about the Greys’ new nanny. She was certainly keeping Sophie and her older brothers Chase and Tripp alive, but she was no Gilly Craster. Even if she had been, Myrcella didn’t feel right about adding another child to her responsibilities when there was absolutely no reason she couldn’t be there to help.

A moment later she saw Wes’ adorable face pop into the classroom and watched as Cole went right towards him. Robb stopped Wes before he could run towards him and bent down, saying something to him and handed him his things and then stroked his hair quickly and stood back up.

She crossed over to them as Wes was running towards Cole and smiled at Robb.

“Good morning!” she greeted him. “Can I walk you out? Cole has a _very_ specific request.”

“Oh uh…,” Robb looked around briefly and then nodded once, “Sure.”

It wasn’t the usual smile and booming greeting she often received but she figured he was rushing for work. In fact, usually he would have gone right over to Cole too, or let him run at him, lifting him up to his head. Not wanting to delay him further she called goodbye to Cole and then headed out into the hallway, waiting for him to follow her.

He came out a moment later and she then had to hurry to keep pace with him.

“So I know that we’re doing something on Saturday,” she started, “And no worries if you all have plans or are just _sick_ of us, but Cole was hoping you’d come over for dinner tomorrow? I could pick up the kids from school and then you could come over after work…”

“What?” Robb asked, as though she had been speaking another language. Or more like she had been speaking the common tongue he just wasn’t listening.

“I was wondering if you wanted to…,” she started but the way he was looking at her reminded her of the way her grandfather would look at Joffrey whenever he would argue with him. Like she was a child that he didn’t have time for and was being forced to speak with anyway. Robb always had time to speak with her though, or he always seemed to make time, anyway. In fact, unless it was to watch one of their children, when she was speaking, he never seemed to look anywhere other than her face. So she had to ask, “Robb, are you alright?”

“I just have more important things to think about than where Wes and I are eating dinner tomorrow,” he snapped.

“O…kay,” she said, though it wasn’t. “I’m sorry I’ll…let you go then.”

“Yeah,” Robb agreed though he made no move to leave.

He was looking at her harshly but almost vacantly too. She didn’t want to anger him further but there was something about his eyes.

She reached her hand out and touched his forearm gently, “Robb are you sure you’re o-“

His face softened momentarily and then he all but flinched away from her and his voice was like ice when he said, “I have to _go_.”

She nodded but he turned away without another look. They were heading in the same direction, but she didn’t think that following him out was the right idea. She waited a beat, smiling and waving at other parents and kids as they walked in. Sophie pointed to her excitedly as she walked in holding her older brother’s hand and Myrcella twitched her nose at her. The little girl seemed to know exactly what she meant because she twitched her nose right back.

When she was sure she wouldn’t be running into, or run over by, Robb in the parking lot she went outside. The rain hadn’t held so she sprinted to her car, having not remember her rain jacket that morning.

She looked in her bag and realized that she’d forgotten her grocery list, so she drove home to go get it and her jacket.

When she got home she half expected to have a text from Robb, but banished that thought when she saw one from Gendry: _hundo percent confirmed for the 29 th_

She sent a gif back of Monica and Phoebe jumping up and down and promised to call him with Cole at dinner tonight so that he could tell him himself. Since she wasn’t in a rush she pulled out another piece of paper and wrote _Gendry Shopping List_ on the top and then wrote down the things he’d definitely want: beer, bacon, kiwi, popcorn, and then started thinking of the meals they could do. He’d be there Friday for dinner and stay through Wednesday of the following week which meant five dinners, five breakfasts, two lunches and then a smattering of other things. She would make his favorites: meatloaf and pulled chicken, and would force him to eat some vegetables, maybe in a spicy curry sauce she knew he liked.

He’d last visited them over the summer and they’d had a wonderful week, partaking in the lazy river and different waterfront activities. Gendry had taken Cole camping in the backyard and it had been all Cole could talk about for a week afterwards.

In spite of herself, every time he came to visit she hoped they’d make it fun enough that he’d choose to move back here. He’d grown up in the Riverlands but had moved to King’s Landing for work while she was still in high school. She knew that he didn’t like it there, but it was a good company and he was climbing through the ranks. Every so often though, it felt like he might apply for a transfer to the Riverlands office.

She forced herself not to get her hopes up. Gendry already gave so much of his free time to her and Cole, she didn’t want to be greedy. They just both missed him, and it was so much more fun when he was around, rounding out their little family. She swallowed the lump in her throat and left the Gendry list on the counter and grabbed her other one and went to the store.

On the way there she received a call from the catering company that Rebecca Harlton had connected her to, confirming their tasting for tomorrow. She tried to as diplomatically as possible suggest that whomever the server was pretend they were dressing for an audience with a queen, as Mrs. Piper was going to arrive determined to hate everything.

Everything about the company seemed promising. She’d spoken to another reference of theirs and they’d confirmed everything that Rebecca had said, and their menus looked inventive and fresh. There was no sad little chicken breast, no aggressive marinara sauce that always made you wonder what exactly it was hiding. It was farm to table, using all local vendors, which seemed like the perfect sort of comfort that would make people linger and drink more wine and up their bids in the silent auction.

After the grocery store she went to the dry cleaner and then the pharmacy and the florist and by the time she’d gotten everything unloaded and put away it was time to head out for her appointment with Dr. Dayne.

She greeted the receptionist and Dr. Dayne appeared a moment later wearing an elegant wrap dress that made Myrcella wish she’d changed out of her black jeans, white sweater and sneakers.

“Hi Myrcella,” Dr. Dayne smiled at her, “Come on in.”

She followed her inside and settled into her seat, making sure that her phone was on silent, except for calls that came in from Cole’s school. Dr. Dayne sat down and crossed her legs in a single, elegant maneuver and Myrcella tried to get comfortable.

“So, how are you?” Dr. Dayne asked.

“I’m good thanks,” she smiled, “How are you?”

“I’m fine thank you,” Dr. Dayne nodded, “Let’s start with the good.”

Myrcella imagined this was a technique. They’d start talking about all of the good things in her life and slowly she’d start to pull at one thread and then another. She knew she was being manipulated, or at the very least handled, but she went along with it because it did comfort her to start off with good things. She didn’t want Dr. Dayne to have a picture of her as though she led a sad miserable little life. Besides, she had a lot to be grateful for and it was good to remind herself of that.

“My brother is coming to visit next weekend,” she informed her.

“Which brother?” Dr. Dayne asked.

“Gendry,” she answered.

“So this is your half-brother?” Dr. Dayne asked conversationally.

“Only technically,” Myrcella answered quickly and then admitted, “We didn’t grow up together, but I’m as close with him now as I am with Tommy. And Cole _worships_ him.”

Dr. Dayne smiled, “I’m sure he’ll be very happy to see him then. Do you two ever talk about it?”

“Talk about what?” Myrcella asked.

“About your father’s transgressions with his mother?” Dr. Dayne prompted, “He’s a few years older than you, is that right?”

“Yes, he is, he’s thirty-three,” she clarified, “And no, we don’t.”

“No?” Dr. Dayne asked, “Why not?”

Myrcella shrugged, “Because it isn’t relevant to us. There have been discussions when it comes to… well, there’s a trust. One that Gendry is fully eligible for, but he refuses to use. So I suppose we’ve talked about it tangentially when I’ve tried to convince him to access it-“

“Why is it important to you that he does so?” Dr. Dayne interrupted.

“Because that’s his money?” Myrcella suggested. Dr. Dayne merely looked at her. “And because it could make a difference in his life. He does very well _now_ , but he didn’t go to university because he and his mother couldn’t afford it. That made everything harder for him. He’s overcome it and _then_ some, and I’m not trying to suggest you can’t be successful without a degree, but… his stubbornness makes his life harder than it has to be sometimes.”

“Does it?” Dr. Dayne asked. Myrcella merely looked at her. Dr. Dayne went on, “Do you think your life would be harder without money?”

Myrcella didn’t try to hide the look of confusion from her face, “Is that a serious question?” Dr. Dayne shrugged and Myrcella shook her head, “Of _course_ it would. I’m a single mother who doesn’t work.”

“But you’re not incapable,” Dr. Dayne pointed out.

“What does that have to do with anything?” Myrcella wondered, “Let’s look at Gendry’s Mom, who was a _wonderful_ mother. She worked herself to the bone so that she could give him a safe place to live and enough food and clothes. If she’d had money, if my father had done what he should have done and provided for them, she could have done whatever she wanted.”

“Is that how you feel?” Dr. Dayne asked.

“Is what how I feel?” she asked.

“Do you feel like you can do anything?” Dr. Dayne clarified.

Myrcella sighed, “That’s not what I meant. I’m just… saying that… trust me I, of all people, am aware that money doesn’t solve all problems. But it does make the day to day much easier. And when you’re wearing a $500 day dress, I’m not sure where you get off acting like I’m being uppity for suggesting it.”

Dr. Dayne laughed, “Fair enough,” then added, “I don’t think you’re being uppity. It’s just something I’ve noticed. You have a preoccupation with money… not in the sense that you’re spoiled or greedy, but rather it seems to cause you no small amount of guilt. And I’m not sure that you don’t use it as a… fuel for denial.”

“I’m not sure I understand what you mean,” Myrcella admitted.

Dr. Dayne paused, clearly measuring her words, and then said, “It’s something you’ve done in passing, so much so that you probably don’t notice it, but you’ll use your _economic_ comfort as a way of glossing over your _emotional_ discomfort. Almost as though to suggest that because you don’t struggle to provide for your son, that you have no right to feel overwhelmed or sad or anything else for that matter.”

“I do?” Myrcella asked. Dr. Dayne nodded and Myrcella stopped to think about it. “I suppose… I suppose that started when my husband passed. People, my mother, friends, would say _well, at least you don’t have to worry about money_. And I think it made me ashamed, because I hadn’t even thought of it, how different my situation would have been if I didn’t have my family’s money or my husband’s.”

“But you still lost your husband,” Dr. Dayne pointed out. “And I agree, you are lucky that you are financially secure, but I think… you may have allowed those people to downplay the trauma and grief you were going through. You may have allowed them to make you feel guilty for it, as though, you didn’t have a right to _grieve your husband_ just because you weren’t left destitute.”

“No I-,” Myrcella suggested at first, and then stopped. “Maybe.”

“Okay,” Dr. Dayne agreed gently. “Would you like to talk about this more?”

Myrcella shook her head, “Not right now. I’d like to think about it a little more if that’s alright.”

“That’s perfectly fine,” Dr. Dayne noted, clearly happy that she’d gotten through at all. Myrcella knew she could be frustrating, but there was no part of her that was trying to get Dr. Dayne to like her anymore, so that in and of itself had to be progress. “Last week we spoke a bit at the end about your other brother, Joffrey. I was wondering if you’d given anymore thought to our discussion?”

“Yes I have,” Myrcella noted, “And I think that I have to disagree with your suggestion of reaching out to him.”

They talked a little bit more about that, going back and forth. Myrcella hated wasting time in her sessions talking about Joffrey. Whatever issues she had with him would remain, she had no desire for closure. She had no desire to forgive him or move on, lest it convince her to allow him into her life.

She had long ago stopped hoping for his redemption and instead focused merely on ensuring Cole would never know him. He had enough good people in his life, he didn’t need Joffrey. She didn’t want him to know that some men were like that. Better that he model himself off of Gendry and Tommy and R-

“Forgive me, Myrcella,” Dr. Dayne said, “But you seem a bit distracted. Is there something else you’d like to talk about for the remainder of our time?”

Myrcella swallowed the lump in her throat.

“It isn’t worth your time,” Myrcella demurred.

“If it’s bothering you it is,” Dr. Dayne corrected her. “You know what I say, no problem too small to ignore, no problem too big to resolve.”

“It’s silly,” Myrcella admitted. “I just… I had a strange interaction with Robb, who is Wes’, my son Cole’s best friend, his father.”

“Yes,” Dr. Dayne nodded, “You’ve mentioned him before. Strange, how?”

“I’m being silly,” she noted. “He just sort of… I don’t think it’s fair to say he _snapped_ but he…I was trying to speak with him this morning about getting together tomorrow evening the four of us and he… I don’t know.”

“Did something happen between you two?” Dr. Dayne asked.

“Not that I’m aware of,” Myrcella shook her head, “But I must have done something to upset him.”

“Well that’s actually not what I meant but let’s focus on that for a moment,” Dr. Dayne noted, “What makes you so sure that you did something to him?”

“Because he couldn’t get away from me fast enough, and he was… I don’t want to say rude but somewhat… dismissive?” Myrcella explained, “And that’s usually not how he is.”

“How is he usually?” Dr. Dayne asked.

“Kind,” Myrcella suggest, “Patient, friendly. He jokes around a lot and he’s so great with his son Wes and with Cole. You know he… he’s a gentleman and he usually walks me out of the school and we talk, not about anything very important or anything but…”

“He sounds wonderful,” Dr. Dayne told her. “And has he ever behaved this way before?”

“Never,” Myrcella noted, “Even last week he was running late and he still walked me to my car because I’d forgotten my umbrella _again_.”

“And you can’t remember doing anything to him?” Dr. Dayne asked.

“No,” she shook her head, “But I must-“

“How often would you say you hurt people’s feelings without realizing it?” Dr. Dayne cut in.

Myrcella started at that, “Well… how would I know?”

“They might tell you,” Dr. Dayne suggested, “Or you might have a pit in your stomach later on when you think about the interaction.”

She nodded, “Every so often I’ll feel that way, if I wasn’t friendly enough to one of the parents at school or I didn’t stop and chat with the cashier at the grocery store.”

“You know, Myrcella,” Dr. Dayne told her, “Not everyone gets that pit in their stomach. Most people wouldn’t think about those innocuous interactions later on.”

“Lucky me,” Myrcella joked.

Dr. Dayne smiled, “What I mean is, from what I’ve seen you focus a lot of time and attention on being pleasant. You may not always succeed, because no one is perfect, but I doubt there are many, if _any,_ instances where you’ve been rude to someone without your knowledge. So, within this situation, I would suggest that perhaps his behavior had nothing to do with you. And within a larger context, I think we may need to explore your propensity for guilt.”

“My prope-what do you mean it had nothing to do with me?” Myrcella asked. “It was to _me_ that he said it.”

Dr. Dayne looked at her for a moment and then said, “Not everyone is as good at compartmentalizing their emotions as you are. A lot of people don’t go through the internal filtering that you do, particularly in moments of stress or anger or sadness.”

_You’re sort of intimidatingly together, in case you weren’t aware._

“Oh,” she said and then glanced at Dr. Dayne and grimaced, “Did I just give myself away as the most self-involved person on the planet?”

Dr. Dayne laughed, “No. But I really do think we need to look at why you are so quick to take on blame.”

Myrcella nodded, “Okay. So you really think he might have just… been upset about something else going on? I don’t want to be crowding him. He said that I didn’t have to worry about intruding on them but… then today, I don’t know.”

“What was the circumstance for that comment?” Dr. Dayne asked.

“Oh, he was inviting me and Wes to the Harvest Festival downtown with his sister and her family,” Myrcella explained.

“Forgive me, but let’s go back now to my original question,” Dr. Dayne noted, “Has something happened between you two, romantically?”

“What?” Myrcella asked, her cheeks heating, “No, of course not.”

“Why of course not?” Dr. Dayne asked.

“For countless reasons,” Myrcella answered.

“Is one of them being you are not interested in him?” Dr. Dayne asked. Myrcella didn’t try to hide her glare. “Fine, that’s fine, but I can’t help but wonder.”

“Wonder what?” Myrcella asked in spite of herself.

“If I missed the mark a bit,” Dr. Dayne pondered.

Ever since she’d met Dr. Dayne, she had been almost annoyed by her therapist’s unflinching self-assurance. It made lesser beings like her quake to behold and achieved its intended purpose of making Myrcella second guess the things she’d long believed to be true. Never had Dr. Dayne once admitted to needing to rethink something herself.

“How do you mean?” Myrcella asked.

Though she was almost positive that whatever Dr. Dayne was going to say would impact her negatively in some way, she was struck with a morbid curiosity.

Dr. Dayne looked at her, “While I _do_ think that you have a habit of being far too hard on yourself, I wonder if there wasn’t something else at play here. And I think you should think about whether, if Robb as you described him, really was _just_ the father of your son’s best friend, would you have reacted so strongly to this interaction?”

“Well,” Myrcella wondered, “Couldn’t we just be friends? Do you like when _your_ friends are upset with you?”

“No, I don’t, and yes, you could be,” Dr. Dayne admitted quickly. Too quickly. “But in your heart of hearts, is that what it feels like?”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> 👀


	9. Chapter 9

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Okay this chapter is loooooong. It is mostly Robb's POV with Myrcella's at the end. 
> 
> I'm not sure what to say except... it's a doozy. I don't know if there are any appropriate trigger warnings and I don't want to give anything away but, it's a doozy.

His head was still pounding in spite of the pain reliever he’d taken and the two glasses of water he’d drained. He wished it was something as silly as a hangover, something he could will away through bacon grease and coffee. Experience told him though that this was going to linger for much of the morning.

“We’re here Daddy,” Wes said gently from the backseat.

“Sorry honey,” he said for what felt like the thirtieth time since he’d woken Wes up. “Let’s get you in to do some good ol’ fashion _learnin_.”

Wes nodded but didn’t shout _yeah!_ the way he might usually. Like his Auntie Sansa, Wes was pretty perceptive and tended to tone down his enthusiasm when Robb did. He hated that Wes noticed, but he had been grateful for the quiet, not having the energy to keep up their usual chatter.

He got out of the car and helped Wes out, letting him hop down and then his son slipped his little hand into his and leaned his cheek against his forearm.

“You doing alright, honey?” Robb asked.

Wes nodded but tugged on his hand so Robb knelt down. His son wrapped his arms around his neck so Robb pulled him into his and stood up, walking him towards the school.

“I’m going to pick you up, alright?” Robb asked.

“Okay Daddy,” Wes nodded against him.

“If it’s still nice, maybe we’ll go for a bike ride,” he suggested.

“Yeah,” Wes agreed.

Robb stroked his hair and nodded in thanks at another parent who held the door open for him. He rubbed Wes’ back as he walked to his class.

Wes put his hands on his shoulders and looked at him. Robb tried for a smile and then Wes smiled back and Robb’s smile stopped feeling forced.

“I need a nosy,” Robb admitted though.

Dutifully Wes leaned forward and rubbed his nose against his and giggled as Robb brought him into his classroom. A bunch of kids were there but he looked around and saw that Cole wasn’t yet.

He got Wes settled and waved to Mr. Tarly but didn’t want to risk getting distracted.

“Wes!” they heard a few moments later.

Cole’s happy face was like a shot of dopamine and Robb found himself smiling as widely as Wes at the sight of him. He’d clearly dressed himself that day and was wearing sweatpants tucked into cowboy boots and a King’s Landing Crowns t shirt.

Wes pulled him in his direction and Robb followed behind trying to catch Ella’s eye. She was very focused on something in Cole’s backpack though, so he merely stepped into speaking distance.

“Cool boots,” he told Cole.

“Thanks!” Cole grinned, “Auntie Margy got them for me.”

Robb only knew that Auntie Margy was married to his Uncle Tommy but the fact that she’d gotten cowboy boots for a five year old suggested she was pretty cool.

“Awesome,” he nodded, then said, because she still hadn’t looked at him, “Hey Ella.”

Ever polite she looked at him and smiled brightly, and fakely, “Morning Robb,” and then more genuinely, “And _hello to you_ sweetheart.”

“Hi!” Wes grinned at her.

“Can I walk you out?” he asked.

If she were a different sort of person she might have said something like _don’t you have more important things to do?_ but she would never be rude in front of her son or his, and likely even not if they weren’t in front of them. His stomach churned at the surprise on her face though.

“Sure,” she nodded though and then looked down at Cole, “The book is in there, baby, but no reading until lunch, alright?”

“Yes Mommy,” Cole agreed and then said to Wes, “I’ll read it to you if you want!”

Wes had no idea what he was talking about but readily agreed anyway. Ella leaned down and hugged Cole so he did the same with Wes.

He and Cole high-fived and Ella turned to smile at Wes, as she was still leaning down, but Wes walked into her arms. She hugged him back, a smile on her face, but then her smile dropped and she crouched down, hugging him tighter, her eyes looking up at him. The concern he saw there made him feel even worse than he already did and he tried to smile reassuringly but it came out as a grimace. Ella stroked Wes’ hair and whispered something in his ear that made his son nod. He released her and she stood up, but she took Cole’s hand and put it directly in Wes’.

If her son thought that was odd, he wasn’t showing it and then the two of them raced off.

She looked at him and he gestured to the door, so she turned around and walked towards it and then through it and then down the hall. It was for him to say something, but he didn’t want to say it inside so they walked outside in silence. He saw her car and headed for it.

“I need to apologize about yesterday,” he said as they got to it.

“Oh, no,” she shook her head, “You have nothing to apologize for.”

“I have plenty to apologize for,” he corrected her. “But… what I said was so unfair and untrue for that matter.”

She shook her head, “I should have just left you alone, you clearly were preoccupied and I was just pushing and-“

“No,” Robb shook his head, “Please don’t stand there blaming yourself because it is only going to make me feel worse. I know you have no reason to, but I really want you to believe me when I say you were just in the wrong place at the wrong time.”

Ella looked at him, really looked at him and then nodded slowly, “Okay. I believe you.”

As soon as he had that assurance he couldn’t hesitate with the rest, “Yesterday was the anniversary of Jeyne’s death.”

He’d had every reaction under the sun to that statement. Gasps, tears, gruff uncomfortable noises. No one ever knew what to do or say, and most wanted to make an exhibition out of their sympathy. It wasn’t their fault, they meant well, but it made him feel exposed and irritable for it.

Ella’s hand moved up and held her throat, her other arm wrapping around her waist and closed her eyes.

“I should have told you that it was coming up,” he admitted.

That was one of the other things he wanted to apologize for.

She shook her head, opening her eyes, “There’s no _should_ when it comes to that. You do whatever you have to do to get through it. I know that there’s no way I could have known, so please don’t brush this aside as mere politeness: I am _so_ sorry that I approached you yesterday morning.”

“Thank you,” he nodded.

“Is there,” Ella started and then shook her head as though she’d been asked this a thousand times and therefore knew how ridiculous it was, “Anything that I can do?”

“You can tell me that you also lose your mind on the anniversary of your husband’s death so that I don’t feel like the world’s biggest failure,” he attempted some levity. Or what might pass for it in this conversation anyway.

She grimaced, and he was about to apologize for being callous when she said, “I’m sorry but I can’t say that I do.”

“Well,” he let out a laugh that sounded heartbroken even to his ears, “I did say you were intimidatingly together.”

“No,” she argued, “It’s not that. I have my days, I promise you. His birthday and mine, our wedding anniversary, the anniversary of our first date, and hundreds of others, but the anniversary of his death just isn’t one of them.”

“Can I…” he started and then stopped, but he couldn’t so he went on, “I’m sorry, but can I ask why? Or how?”

“Because,” she winced, “In some ways that was the best day of my life.”

Robb looked at her for a moment and wondered if he’d somehow misjudged her entirely. He had thought she was a widow who’d lost her husband, the man that she’d loved, but he wondered now if that wasn’t true. There was nothing that could have happened the day Jeyne passed away to make him remember it as one of the best days of his life.

As though that was written all over his face she went on, “That was the day Cole was born.”

_Except that_.

It was such specific wording. It wasn’t _he died on Cole’s birthday,_ but rather _the day Cole was born_. She had lost her husband and given birth to their son on the same day. He wasn’t entirely sure how a person could survive swinging on that pendulum.

There were a million questions he wanted to ask her, so he settled for the one that may give way to all the others, “Can I buy you a coffee?”

She looked at him for a long moment. He knew that in other circumstances she likely wouldn’t hesitate. It was good that she thought about it, that she knew that if she agreed he’d have questions. That it wouldn’t be a conversation between them where they talked about all the weird things their kids were doing.

“Okay,” she agreed.

They decided to meet at a coffee shop on Pine and Ella got into her car and then he went over to his. It was a short drive, going the opposite way of traffic, and he fought his mind wandering to all of the questions he had for her so that he could focus on the drive. Even still it couldn’t stop entirely.

_The day Cole was born._

The specificity continued to plague him.

“By the gods,” he muttered to himself, stubborn tears pricking at his eyes.

She’d lost her husband and given birth to her son in the same day. His mind kept going back to that simple, horrible fact. He couldn’t help but wonder what the order had been. Had he lived long enough to meet his son? To hold her hand in the delivery room? Or…

“Fuck,” he banged his hand on the steering wheel and then looked around nervously.

He never lost focus when he drove, he never zoned out. He took a deep breath and focused on the other cars and the traffic lights and all the things he should be thinking of.

There was a spot right out front of the coffee shop, but he wasn’t sure if Ella had gotten there already so he went to one a bit further down the street. He walked back to the one in front of the coffeeshop and stood in it and a moment later her car appeared so he got back onto the curb. She pulled into it and he waited while she grabbed her things and then joined him on the curb.

“It’s nice,” he told her and she looked at him, “Out… do you want to take them to go?”

He figured it would be better to talk without a lot of ears, without hearing their voices reverberate on the walls. Even three years later he was never sure when he’d start crying over the whole thing and he wasn’t sure if she was the same. Until ten minutes ago he hadn’t even known how long it had been, now he knew exactly, down to the day.

“Yeah,” she agreed, braving a smile, “It would be nice to walk a bit.”

They went inside and ordered their coffees – hot, black for him, vanilla/hazelnut, iced for her – and came back outside. She pulled a pair of sunglasses out of her bag and put them on and whether it was to avoid the sun or simply cover her eyes he wasn’t sure and he wasn’t going to ask.

Turning off Pine they got onto the river walk. There were people riding their bikes and running and walking, but not so many that they couldn’t keep a comfortable distance from them. It was really a beautiful day, the rushing river sparkled in the sun and because it was so clear it was possible to see for miles.

“If every day was like this,” Ella noted, “Riverrun would be as overcrowded as King’s Landing.”

“Thank goodness for the rain then,” he agreed and she nodded.

He sipped his coffee and she did the same, knowing where the conversation had to lead but having absolutely no understanding of how to get there. If it had been different, he might have told her that they didn’t need to talk about it. But he did, need to talk about it. About Jeyne. And he needed her to talk about Trystane.

It was selfish, he knew, but he didn’t have anyone else. No one that understood. Sansa had tried to get him to go to some groups but taking on all those strangers’ pain had felt impossible, and there was such a self-consciousness to their sadness. No one allowed themselves to just be in it.

Ella, though, she had seemed to master hers. He pitied her that, envied her too.

It felt like she was the only one who might understand. And beyond that, he knew, was his desire to understand her.

Braver than him she said, “I suppose I left you sort of curious.”

“You did,” he admitted and then acknowledged, “And I’m sorry. It’s… I don’t have a _right_ to know. But… it feels like…”

She nodded and then provided the details in clipped, efficient sentences, “I got pregnant a year after Trystane and I married. Four months later, Trystane kept noting a lot of pain in his side. I tried to convince him to – but you know. When he went there was nothing they could do, the cancer was too advanced. They gave him a year but… he didn’t use it all.”

There was a part of him that had known it hadn’t been quick. He wasn’t entirely sure how he could tell such a thing, but he had known it. It was something that happened every so often when she revealed a part of herself. This odd sort of understanding, the way puzzle pieces slowly revealed a familiar image as they each got placed down.

“He died the day Cole was born?” he couldn’t help but ask, knowing that somehow he hadn’t heard the worst.

She nodded but that bravado slipped. He guided her gently to a bench and when she sat down he sat beside her. Usually, she sat quite primly, her posture that of a ballet dancer, now though she brought one of her legs up and hugged it to her chest. She was younger than he was, only twenty-eight, but she looked younger yet even though it was clear that all that had happened had aged her irrevocably.

He wanted to reach out and hold her hand or her shoulder or rub her back the way he did with Wes. Anything to let her know that he was here, right here, and he’d sit and wait as long as it took for her to be ready. She looked though like someone who didn’t want to be touched, so he sat on his hand to resist that needling urge.

“It would be more correct to say that Cole was born the day Trystane died,” she amended, though, she let out a heartbroken laugh that tore his insides out, “Like father, like son, they were both early.” She looked at him and pushed up her sunglasses and explained, “I thought we were going to have more time, Trystane and I, but the cancer was so volatile. They’d said a year and it hadn’t even been three months, and besides, Trystane had _promised_ to make it to the birth.” He watched as tears filled her eyes and she closed them, clearly trying to force them back in but they stubbornly fell down onto her cheeks. She wiped them away quickly, and then opened her eyes, her face horrified, “I’m sorry, I don’t talk about this a lot so I’m not very good at telling this story. I don’t blame him, he just… wanted to be there so badly and,” she smiled even as more tears fell, “He _always_ got what he wanted. So I think I had convinced myself that he’d get that too. So when he died, far too early, I… my body was too weak. Cole wasn’t supposed to arrive for two more weeks but…”

He could finish the story from there. Twenty-three and eight and a half months pregnant, just having lost the love of her life, she’d gone into labor out of grief. And surprise.

That wasn’t the whole story though, the romantic part of him noted. The part that had made him plan his proposal to Jeyne for months and who heard her in Wes’ laugh told him the rest.

It wasn’t just her body reacting, it was Cole. Saving his mother’s life.

Nothing else had helped him in the days following Jeyne’s death like Wes. His sweetness and love, and the way he needed him. An ability to focus on the daily tasks of feeding him and bathing him and keeping him as happy as he could be as he suffered a loss he didn’t understand.

Had he lost Jeyne so suddenly before Wes, he wasn’t entirely sure where he would be now. He wasn’t sure _if_ he would be now.

“It’s silly,” she told him, “But I’ve always felt like Trystane nudged him, you know. I’m sorry, I must sound crazy… it’s just… Cole gave me something to live for.”

“Yeah,” Robb agreed, because it may sound crazy, but it was a shared madness. He had never believed in any of that stuff before, he wasn’t entirely sure that he did now. There wasn’t a part of him that felt Jeyne at his side, like she was in the room with him. Like he’d told Sansa and Jon, he understood that she was gone from the earth, even if not from his mind. Even still every spring, the hydrangeas seemed to bloom on the day he was missing her most. And he knew that if his had been their situation, and he was leaving his young, beautiful wife alone in this world, he would have nudged Wes too. “I think so too.”

She seemed to take him at his word and sipped her coffee. Brushing the remaining tears off of her face she lifted it towards the sun. The light was catching in her hair and to his utter surprise he saw her almost smile.

“You should change careers,” she noted and then looked at him, “Dr. Dayne has wanted me to tell that story for a month now.”

He remembered her telling him that she was more closed off than him, and he’d told her that she just had to be comfortable. It was not lost on him what an honor it was that she found herself first comfortable with him.

“Maybe now you will,” he suggested, “Because I’m sure whatever she’ll say will be more helpful than whatever I could.”

“Are you?” she asked, “I’m not.”

“Can I ask more then? I’m sorry I don’t want to push but…,” he trailed off.

She nodded.

“This is admittedly not the most important question,” he told her, “But I think I’m still getting my bearings here so… I’m just curious, given the timing…”

“Why I didn’t name him Trystane?” she guessed the exact question he was going to ask. He nodded, unsurprised that their thoughts were in line and she nodded back and told him, “He wouldn’t let me. Though the day it happened was a shock, we both knew it was coming eventually. We…we had time to discuss, a lot,” she looked at him then and said, “I’m sorry that you didn’t get that.” As far as he knew, she didn’t know the circumstances of Jeyne’s death, but perhaps the fact that it had been quick was just as obvious to her as it was to him that Trystane’s wasn’t. “We thought he’d get to meet him, but we knew they wouldn’t have long together. Trystane thought it would be too painful for me, to say his name so often. So he chose Cole. He thought it would help me remember only the good things.”

“Cole?” he asked.

She smiled then a faraway, tragic, gorgeous smile that made him feel guilty. It wasn’t for him and yet he was the one who got to see it and he found that he couldn’t look away from it.

“For Cole Porter,” she noted, a slight blush on her cheeks. She looked at him, as though wondering if he wanted to hear this and he tried to make it clear that he did. “It was how we met. We were at some… holiday function. I had kept seeing him around and had thought that he’d seen me too. It was one of those stuffy cocktail parties, and everyone was standing around having the same, boring conversations. I wouldn’t have gone but my uncle had asked me to be his date. I was talking to these boring old men and then I felt someone take my hand and suddenly I was dancing. Before I even looked up, I _knew_ it was him. I tried to be so coy, though inside I was a puddle. I wouldn’t have been able to stand upright if he hadn’t been holding me. _No one else is dancing_ I pointed out and he smiled and said, _That’s their problem, I’ve got my own._ And I asked what his problem was and he said, _I’ve gone to half a dozen of these things in the past month just to give myself a chance of seeing you, and I don’t think I can take it any longer._ And I remember pouting slightly - I was _such_ a fool - and I asked _Don’t you think I’m worth a few more_?” Robb didn’t realize he was chuckling until she stopped talking and smiled at him. “He didn’t answer, he just spun me and kept dancing, this all-knowingness in his eyes, like I’d just told him everything. Like I had confessed to picking out the dress I was wearing for the sole purpose of him seeing me in it. Which I suppose I had. Anyway, the song was Cole Porter’s _Night and Day_. We danced to it at our wedding too.”

It was so easy to picture. An older version of Cole in a suit, crossing a crowded room and pulling Ella away from all those old men, the pair of them not being able to look away from one another, Ella trying to play it cool when there was absolutely no reason to. He’d have been gone for her already. She was just that kind of girl. It was the sort of movie Jeyne might have dragged him to, and she’d assure him the whole way home that he was far more handsome than the male lead, who had been so full of charm and confidence.

“So he was that guy,” Robb realized.

He didn’t have to elaborate, Ella nodded, “He was, absolutely. Growing up how I did in King’s Landing, I’d met my fair share of peacocks. All my boyfriends had been shy, as some sort of rebellion or something, and then he came along and for some reason his cockiness never seemed to bother me the way it did in other boys, men, that I’d known. He was so sure of things, of me.”

“I’m sure he pursued you mercilessly,” Robb guessed.

“Viciously,” she agreed and then laughed, shrugging, “But the truth is, I hardly put up a fight. I tried but there seemed little point in it, when I wanted so badly to be caught.”

“And I’ll bet he loved you,” Robb told her.

“With every bit of himself,” she agreed. And then she turned to him with soft, dangerous eyes, “As you loved Jeyne.”

He had known it would come back around to him. Ella wasn’t the sort of person that spoke of herself often, and she’d hardly let him off the hook after yesterday. In truth, he didn’t want to be let off the hook. He felt as though he knew her so much better now and he craved for her to know him too.

So he nodded and admitted, “I fell for her instantly. It had never happened to me that way, I’d had attraction to girls, of course, too many probably if I’m being honest, but when I met her, I guess it wasn’t _love_ but it was an understanding that this was going to be something.”

Ella smiled, “Did she resist?”

He chuckled, “No, not really. Of course, at the time it felt like she did, but looking back, no. And she was a very loyal, earnest person. When she gave in, she gave in fully and never looked back.”

“Does Wes look like her?” she asked.

“He’s all her,” Robb agreed, “Except his eyes. Jeyne had these doe eyes. I’d never really found brown eyes all that interesting until I looked into hers.”

“And then you couldn’t look away,” Ella guessed.

“No,” he agreed, “I couldn’t. Not that I wanted to. She was a very… easy person to love. There was nothing complicated about it, her. I don’t mean she was shallow, she wasn’t at all. She was frightfully clever, actually, she just made _everything_ easy.”

“Yeah,” Ella nodded, wiping a tear from her cheek. “I’m sorry but…”

“Go on,” he allowed, attempting lightness when he said, “Fair’s fair.”

“Did…,” she started, “Did she pass away in a car accident?”

“Yes,” he confirmed. “Did Sansa-“

“No,” she shook her head, “You just… I don’t know if you know that you do it, but you always ask if I’m alright to drive, and you’re so careful when you do so I just sort of…”

“Yeah,” he agreed, “It… it wasn’t a drunk driving accident or anything, you know um, there was no culprit. She was driving one afternoon, broad daylight, no rain, and a deer came in the road. That’s what a witness said anyway. Jeyne swerved to avoid hitting it and the way the car hit the tree just…”

He felt her hand on the back of his head, the way she’d held Wes and he felt a pitiful sob well up in his chest.

“You know I’ve read about people whose last words to their loved ones had been ones of anger, you know with those freak accidents,” he explained and shook his head, “Mine weren’t. Ours were _love you._ Not any big declaration or anything, just the fact of it. She was just heading out running errands, it was an average day, and I don’t know… you know a part of me wishes that there had been a reckless driver, someone to blame. Because now I can’t help but wonder if she was distracted, or if there was something I missed, some reason she _shouldn’t_ have been driving that day. Something that could have made her see the deer just a half second too late, the difference between having a scare and losing her life.”

“I know it’s useless to tell you it wasn’t your fault,” she allowed, “If I told you how many nights I lay awake even before Trystane passed, wondering why I didn’t drag him to the doctor earlier. Knowing it wouldn’t have done anything didn’t help, still doesn’t. I’m not sure that anyone who loses someone like we have ever feels innocent again.”

“I’ve…,” he started, not sure how to go on, “There’s… I’m sorry I just…”

There was a part of it that he’d never told anyone, not even Sansa. A part that he rarely allowed himself to think of, except on the anniversary when he couldn’t stop. She just understood so much better than anyone else ever could, and to not tell her now would feel like a lie.

He knew that she could feel it, and her other hand reached out and held his arm.

“I’m right here,” she promised gently, as he’d wanted to promise her just moments earlier.

“We, Jeyne and I, had been trying for a while and…,” he sniffed back tears, knowing that they’d be angry, relentless ones.

“She… _Jeyne_ ,” Ella’s lip wobbled, her hand gripping his arm, “She was pregnant?”

“Two months,” Robb confirmed.

Her hands left him and she went to get up but she must have pushed herself too quickly and her iced coffee spilled all over the bench.

“Oh gods, I’m sorry, I’m sorry,” she cried, moving with shaking fingers to pick it up, trying to brush the ice back in the cup as though it wouldn’t melt onto the ground below before too long anyway.

“No it’s okay,” he assured her, standing up as well and trying to stop her gently.

“No,” she lamented, “It’s not. You’re so _good_ and you’re such a wonderful father and I’m…,” she slapped the back of the bench, “Damn it. I’m sorry.”

“It’s okay,” he rubbed her back, “I’m sorry I shouldn’t have burdened you with that.”

“It’s not a burden,” she looked up at him, her jade eyes filled with tears. She shook her head, “It’s _not_ a burden.”

He nodded, because it seemed important to her that he understood that. That he believed her, just as he’d been desperate for her to believe him.

“Is there more?” she asked softly.

“No,” he promised. “There’s no more.”

“Okay,” she agreed, “I’m sorry. I really want to be here for you…”

He shook his head, “I weirdly feel a lot better having told someone.”

That wasn’t the whole truth. He didn’t feel better having told someone. He felt better having told her, even as it seemed to tear her in two.

Yesterday had been awful. Somehow worse than the year before. He’d tried to go to work, wanting to distract himself, but had only managed to make it through one meeting before he had to leave. Gilly had picked up Wes from school and he hadn’t joined them until dinner time, having spent all afternoon in his bedroom, watching videos of her and crying his eyes out. It was why he’d woken with a headache, that he only just realized had subsided.

There was something cathartic in sharing though, just as Sansa had suggested there would be. He felt lighter, less fuzzy, a strange sort of adrenaline coursing through his veins that allowed him to think more clearly.

Their confessions had seemed to have the opposite effect on her. It was unsurprising, in a way. He had always been extroverted, and as hard as it was to hear her story, to tell his, it energized him too in a way that connecting with people always did. And he hadn’t connected with anyone like this in a long time. She, despite her friendliness, was not, and having not told her story in five years, only to do so and then immediately hear his, had understandably seemed to wipe her out.

She nodded, as though she could see that, and tried and failed to smile, “I’m sorry… but can I go home?”

“Of course,” he agreed, having just been about to suggest it. “Are you okay to drive?”

She looked at him for a long moment and then shook her head, “I don’t think so.”

He was struck by such a sudden surge of emotion that he was almost surprised that he kissed her forehead as gently as he did.

“Thank you,” he whispered, “For telling me.”

Because that more than anything showed him that she was the exact right person to have told. That she understood how completely what had happened had changed him, and that knowing it had happened would now forever change her too. She didn’t even resist it, even though he knew that she never liked to feel inadequate. It was a gift that she was giving him, this vulnerability, and he had no choice but to treat it as such.

“This is what I think we should do,” he said as he released her. “I’m going to take you home now. I’m not working today because I wanted the afternoon with Wes. So I’m going to pick him and Cole up after school -,” she opened her mouth and he shook his head, “Trust me after the day Wes and I had yesterday, Cole is exactly what we need.” She smiled at that, and he was glad that it was obvious he wasn’t just saying it. “And then we can come get you, later on, and bring you back here to pick up your car, and we can all do dinner together. Like you suggested yesterday. It’s just going to be me, no Gilly, though so um… we’ll order pizza.” She actually laughed, before looking up at him with a grimace, “Say okay.” 

She let out a deep breath and nodded, “Okay.”

***

The woman looking at her in the mirror as she dusted a bit of blush on her cheeks looked younger than she had in some time.

It had been a harder day than she’d usually admit. This morning though had left her vulnerable. In the end, it had been surprisingly easy to talk about Trystane. It wouldn’t have been, most likely, if it had been anyone other than Robb, but he understood. Afterwards though, while she didn’t regret it, she had felt weak. Being that open with someone else, letting them in, was so unusual for her that she’d felt as though she’d used muscles she hadn’t stretched in years, and though she knew it was good for her, she felt the ache of it all the same.

When she’d fallen back into bed and wept, she knew that only some of her tears were for Trystane. The rest were for Robb, and the wife and child he’d lost.

It was astonishing that someone who’d lost as much as he, so rapidly, so without warning or reason, could be so kind, so open and gracious. She could see it all, the family that he and Wes could have had. When she thought of his son, who’d held her so tightly that morning, the tears had started again.

She’d fallen into a deep sleep and had been surprised when she woke that she felt truly lighter. It had been nearly three o’clock by the time she’d gotten out of bed and she took a long bath and washed her hair, though she had already that morning and blown it dry leisurely. Robb had told her that they’d pick her back up at 5:30 so at five she’d dressed in dark high waisted jeans and a thin cream-colored turtleneck, stepping into a pair of old mules. She’d had a little time left over and underneath her eyes were red from crying so she’d put on some concealer and added a little mascara and some blush and a moisturizing lip balm that would hopefully temper any dryness from crying.

At 5:29 she looked out her window and saw Robb’s car coming down the drive so she grabbed her phone and went downstairs. Her handbag was on the counter where she left it so she took that, making sure her keys were inside of it before heading towards the front door.

“YOU NEED A COAT,” Wes and Cole called from the rolled down window of the backseat.

“What?” she laughed.

Robb rolled down his window and leaned over, “We voted and decided you need to bring coats with you more often.”

“I have one in my car,” she promised.

“Then come on Mommy!” Cole called happily.

She closed and locked the door and then hurried down the front walk, climbing in the front seat.

“Hi!” she smiled at all of them.

“HIIII,” Wes and Cole greeted her in tandem.

“Hey,” Robb smiled back, “You…”

“All good,” she nodded, meaning it.

He waited for her to buckle her seatbelt and then drove back down her drive. They told her all about their afternoon. Apparently he and Wes had ridden their bikes while Cole borrowed Wes’ scooter. They were still working their way up to no training wheels, but Cole wasn’t ready just yet. Though, she imagined, he was probably closer now having seen Wes ride without.

They got to her car and she told Robb she’d be right behind them. Had he been anyone else she likely wouldn’t have admitted to not feeling up to driving, but her hands had been shaking and after everything Robb had told her she didn’t feel right getting behind the wheel. She was all Cole had, and she wasn’t going to allow her pride to get in the way of his well-being.

“We’ll meet you at the house?” Robb asked.

“I’ll be right behind you,” she assured him, her hands now as steady as ever.

It was a short drive to Robb’s and the pizza delivery guy was pulling in right behind her. She hopped out of her car ready to pay but Cole and Wes waylaid her, and as though the three of them had planned it Robb used the opportunity to go grab the pizzas and pay for them. Cole took one of her hands and Wes took her other, and they told her more about what they’d done and all of the things they wanted to do on Saturday.

Apparently, Cole had shared his plan of trampoline, dance party and tacos and it had been met with a good deal of enthusiasm. Though they’d added a movie and had apparently tried to sneak a sleepover past Robb who had put that firmly in the _we’ll see_ column.

Cole had never had a sleepover, the closest he’d gotten was camping with his Uncle Gendry in the backyard, and it was definitely a _we’ll see_ for her too. She was more than happy to have Wes but something told her he was no more use to them than Cole and she didn’t know if Robb would be comfortable.

“Thank you,” she said to Robb as he let them in.

He smiled at her and opened the door and they all walked in.

“Can I set the table?” she offered.

“We’re all set up,” Robb said.

She furrowed her brow, because the kitchen table was definitely empty, but then Wes said, “Look Ella! You’re next to me!”

“And me!” Cole agreed and then she was being pulled down the hall.

They brought her into the dining room, which as Robb had noted, was all set up. There were plates at four places and what looked to be place cards.

Hers was at one end of the table and said _Ella/Cole’s Mommy_ and was decorated with butterfly stickers. She walked around the table, looking at everyone else’s. Cole’s predictably had dragons, Robb/Wes’ Daddy had wolves, which she’d have to ask him about later, and Wes’ also unsurprisingly had dragons on it.

“Wow,” she smiled, “This looks great.”

“It was Daddy’s idea!” Wes noted.

She glanced at Robb and he shrugged, “What I lack in cooking ability I make up for in style.”

She laughed, “You certainly do. What can I do?”

“Just sit,” Robb urged as he set the pizzas down on the table.

There was a salad already out and a pitcher of water. The boys had plastic cups but it was clear that hers and Robb’s were fine crystal.

“I can grab a bottle of wine, but I figured…” Robb suggested.

“Water is perfect,” she assured him, “I’ll pour.”

The boys handed her their cups and she poured those as Robb determined everyone’s pizza preferences and doled them out. She got a good portion of salad on the boys’ plates and then added a generous helping to hers before handing it to Robb.

Soon they were all settled at the table and there were a hundred different conversations going on at once. Wes seemed much recovered from this morning and was as happy as he usually was. Cole was telling her all about how Robb could ride his bike with no hands and when she glanced at Robb he dusted off his shoulder, a smirk on his face, which told her that he was much recovered too.

The boys finished quickly and to her surprise, so did she and Robb. She hadn’t eaten since that morning, which wasn’t all that unusual, but she’d been ravenous and had eaten two slices of pizza and a second helping of salad in the same time that Robb ate four slices of pizza and his salad.

“Can we play fetch with Grey Wind?” Cole asked.

Robb glanced at her and then nodded, “Go ahead.”

She and Robb cleared the table and she wrapped up the leftover pizza and put it in the fridge and covered the salad.

“Can I do those?” she asked as Robb settled at the sink.

“The four plates and forks?” he asked with a grin, “No I think I got it. You can keep me company though.”

She hopped up on the counter as he turned on the water and rinsed the plates one by one, opening the dishwasher on his other side and placing them inside.

“Thank you,” she said. “For… everything. That sounds really silly but… I mean it.”

“It doesn’t sound silly,” he told her as he washed the crystal water glasses.

She held her hand out for the one he’d finished and he handed it to her and she picked up a dish cloth and started drying.

“And I know we skirted over this because of obvious things,” he went on, “But I really want to apologize for yesterday. No matter what, I will _never_ speak to you like that again.”

“Thank you,” she nodded, though that felt incomplete. “I… I’m not saying this to make you feel bad… but it _really_ upset me.”

He looked at her, turning the water off. Focusing all of his attention on her the way she’d grown used to. The reason she’d been so caught off guard yesterday.

“Disproportionately,” she admitted then, his uncompromising gaze beckoning honesty from her. Those muscles were well stretched now, and she found them craving further efforts. “It was pointed out to me… that… I was overreacting.”

“I was terrible,” he argued.

“You weren’t amazing,” she allowed with a small smile and he gave her one back. She shook her head though, not sure why she was so intent on him knowing this but needing for him to understand. “But I was really affected by it, because it was _you_.”

She watched as understanding dawned. He really did have a terrible poker face and she saw each emotion have its moment as he took that in.

“I uh…,” he scratched his cheek before leaning on the counter, “Never really can stomach seeing anyone that day.” She nodded but his eyes tinged in red and he let out a shaky breath, “But… it… well it felt especially hard seeing you.”

The way his pupils widened told her that her poker face was slipping too as she took that in. She wondered if they experienced the emotions in the same order. Surprise, happiness, guilt, sadness, guilt once again.

It felt wrong, to hear that, but somehow wonderful, too.

Even still she had to make it clear, “But I’m not…”

“Me either,” he agreed then admitted, “I’m just glad I’m not alone.”

“No,” she shook her head, “You’re not alone.”

It was such specific wording. It wasn’t just _I’m glad you feel it too_ or _I’m glad I’m not crazy_. _I’m just glad I’m not alone._

That was it. It was so exactly it. For so long she’d had Cole but no one else, not really. She had her family, who she loved, but they all had their own lives. All of things she was experiencing. The everyday joys and the great big heartaches, all of it had been on her own. And it was why she had been comfortable talking to him when she wasn’t with Dr. Dayne. Why yesterday had hurt so acutely.

Robb reminded her what it felt like not to be alone, and it beckoned her long suppressed desire not to be.

She leaned forward and Robb’s eyes widened slightly but she ducked her head and laid it on his shoulder. After a moment he stepped closer to her, and then she felt the comforting weight of his head resting against the top of hers.

There would be a time, she knew, that they’d have to deal with it. Whatever it, this, was between them. But for now, it was enough to hear the delighted shrieks of their children playing outside and know that he was hearing the exact same thing, at the exact same time, and it was making him feel the exact same way.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> HELP: I need to know what you all think bc this ch nearly *killed* me


	10. Chapter 10

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Thank you all for your lovely and supportive comments on the last chapter. I had planned that chapter for so long but was so nervous about writing/posting it. 
> 
> This chapter is much lighter, I hope you enjoy!

“You were against this from the start,” his Uncle Edmure pointed out.

“Yes, I was,” Robb had no reason to deny it. “That doesn’t change the facts of it. We have no need to do business with Walder Frey.”

In fact, Robb was pretty sure that within two years, no one would be doing business with Walder Frey. Not if he had anything to say about it. The man was a poison to the Riverlands. He reneged on deals, refused to pay for labor done, not to mention the many, _many_ sexual harassment claims that had been raised and then buried. Nearing ninety the man had wielded too much power for far too long. There were worse things too. He had a number of low income properties and there were rumors of rent being raised midway through a lease when the tenant was a beauty with little means of covering the difference.

His grandfather hadn’t given old Walder the time of day. There was no real need to, he wasn’t competition for Tully Corp. but Robb had always been taught to defeat bullies for those who couldn’t.

“I think if you just r-,” Edmure went on.

“No,” Robb’s voice brooked no further discussion. “I’m sorry, Uncle Edmure, but my answer is no.”

Edmure looked at him and then Uncle Brynden and got up. He’d take him for a beer later that week, or maybe have him over the house for breakfast with Wes over the weekend.

His son always made his Uncle smile and given that his Dad was up North and Jeyne’s father was dead, Uncle Edmure was technically the closest thing Wes had to a grandfather around. Though, Uncle Brynden really filled that role, as he always had for Robb.

Edmure got up then and left the room, not bothering to close the door behind him. Robb sighed, rubbing his face as Uncle Brynden looked out the window.

“Don’t beat yourself up,” his uncle told him, “He’s just pissy because that little girlfriend of his is going to make him pay for not making this work.”

Robb scoffed, “Come on. You don’t actually think he’d push this for her, do you? They’ve been dating for less than a month.”

“Apparently,” Brynden sat down, “She’s the one.”

“Good for him,” Robb said honestly.

His uncle should have settled down years ago. He didn’t have any children of his own and though he could be a bit of a fool, he would be a loving, dependable father. His mom had always worried about her younger brother, and he knew his dad had bailed him out a time or two when an attempt to go off on his own had ended poorly.

“Well you know what they say,” Brynden shrugged, “The gods love to reward a fool.”

Robb covered his laugh with a cough and pushed all of the Frey materials to one side of the table.

“Now that that’s settled, can we talk about something important?” Robb asked.

“Go on,” Brynden agreed.

“Wes’ birthday,” Robb noted, “It’s not falling over Thanksgiving this year so I’m going to do a party here.”

“You know Sansa will do a second one when we get up there,” Uncle Brynden pointed out.

“I know,” Robb nodded, “But its his fifth birthday, and he’s got all these friends now… so I feel like he’ll want something more than just us and Gilly.”

“Strippers?” Brynden suggested.

Robb tilted his head from side to side, “That feels more like classic sixth birthday material.”

Brynden chuckled, “I’ll think of something else. You want to do it at the house?”

“I think so,” Robb nodded, “And it’ll have to be inside but I don’t know… are magicians still cool?”

“Were…they ever?” Brynden asked.

“I don’t know,” Robb admitted, then thought about it, “Maybe Ella’ll have some suggestions.”

“Myrcella Martell? Cole’s Mum?” Brynden asked.

“Yeah, she’s got a finger on the pulse of the kindergarten set,” Robb nodded.

Brynden smirked and then said, “You guys spending some time together?”

“Uh yeah, you know um, the boys,” Robb noted, shuffling some papers.

“Robb, you suck at being demure,” Brynden noted.

“I know,” Robb admitted, leaning back, “But it’s not a thing. Yet. It might not ever be, I don’t know. She’s just a good friend.”

“I remember when I had good friends,” Brynden noted, “None of them looked like her, though.”

“What do you know about how she looks?” Robb asked, unsure of why he felt jealousy churning in his stomach at the idea of his seventy-six year old uncle merely knowing what she looked like.

“I see her at half a dozen things throughout the year,” Brynden pointed out, which made sense. His uncle for all his gruffness had never shirked carrying on the Tully’s philanthropic traditions. “Hell of a fundraiser.”

With men, his tone implied. He imagined single and married men alike fell all over themselves to add another zero to their donations when Ella came calling. A pretty face could do wonders for a good cause.

“I’m sure she is,” Robb noted, because in addition to a pretty face she had eloquence, a sharp mind and a spine of steel on her side.

He wouldn’t bet against her in any circumstance.

“Robb I think -,” Brynden started.

“I know,” Robb interrupted. “Okay? I know. But no. Not right now.”

“Okay,” Brynden agreed quickly. Too quickly. His uncle smiled, clearly noting the surprise on his face, “Not right now is a big improvement on where you were a year ago, Robb. Hell, it’s a big improvement on where you were a _month_ ago. You know your own mind, you always have. You’ll know when it’s right.”

“And what if it isn’t, ever?” Robb asked.

Brynden looked at him, “I said you knew your own mind. But clearly that heart of yours is another story.”

Robb scoffed, “You’ve really softened in your old age.”

Brynden chuckled, “Yeah well, so have you.”

He was about to say that he didn’t really think of thirty-four as _old age_ when Aggie popped her head into his office, “It’s 5:30 Robb.”

“Thank you,” Robb stood up and then pointed to his uncle, “But the next time I’m in here alone with him, feel free to make up some urgent call I have to be on.”

Aggie laughed, “No deal. He’s scarier than you are.”

Brynden gave him a triumphant look as though to say _see, whose the softy now?_

Robb grabbed his things and said goodnight to both of them and headed to his car. He checked his texts on the way and saw that he had one from Ella: _Hey, I sent Gilly home early because she wasn’t feeling well. Can you come grab Wes when you’re out of work?_

He saw then that he also had a voicemail and text from Gilly telling him the same thing. She’d seemed a bit tired the day before but not sick, so he set a reminder to call her tomorrow morning to see how she was doing. He could always work from home tomorrow afternoon if she was still under the weather.

He texted Ella back saying that he was on his way and then got in the car. It was a short drive over to her house, and he pulled down the drive a few minutes later.

Robb got out of his car and knocked on the door and a moment later she answered it, her index finger in front of her lips and whispering, “ _Shh_.”

“ _What’s going on?_ ” he whispered back as she opened the door and let him in.

Rather than answer him she grabbed his hand and tugged him through the house. The events of last week had seemed to break down some of the physical barriers they’d had with one another. Whereas before, he felt goodbyes were always awkward, unsure of whether he should kiss her cheek or give her a high five or a hug or just a wave. There had definitely been a moment over the weekend when he’d picked her up on the trampoline, but only so that he could body slam her the way he’d been doing to Wes and Cole.

He was not accustomed to having her hand in his and he could feel his heart beating.

It steadied to a comforting thrum though when she brought him to where he could peak onto the sun porch. Sitting on one of the chairs, imperious as any queen, was Sophie Grey. She was reading a book to Wes and Cole, who were sitting in front of her with their legs crossed, the pair of them looking at her with rapt attention. Sophie was wearing what looked to be a scarf of Ella’s draped over her head, Wes was wearing a cowboy hat and Cole was wearing a tiara.

“ _They’ve been doing this for an hour_ ,” Ella tilted her head back and whispered.

He could feel her light breath on his cheek as she did and he realized then that their hands were still clasped and he was right behind her, his nose all but in her golden, sweet smelling, hair. It was not lost on him that a part of him, in that moment, was very ready and he stepped away from her, releasing her hand.

She glanced back at him and then as though she also realized how close they were she turned around, her back against the wall so the kids wouldn’t see them.

That didn’t really help things though because now she was mere inches away, looking up at him with pale jade eyes, a blush running up her cheeks.

It was that blush, more than anything.

Usually it was comforting, knowing that she was feeling what he was feeling. Whether it was awe at their children, or delight in something silly, or even grief. Now though, it was a dangerous thing.

As though Ella felt _that_ too she whispered, “ _I want to keep her._ ”

He smirked, and chided, “Ella, we’ve talked about this.”

She giggled and then covered her mouth, “She’s an angel.”

“I know,” Robb agreed, because it was true.

Sophie had been in his group on the apple picking field trip and she was, as Ella described, sweet as sugar. She’d called him _Mr. Stark_ even when he’d said she could call him Robb and told him he was _shivulruss_ (chivalrous) when he’d lifted her up so that she could get the perfectly shiny red apple she’d had her heart set on. At one point Wes had fallen and had been embarrassed and about to cry, but Sophie had sidled up to him and taken his hand and pulled him towards something else and his son had been laughing again in no time.

“Let’s let them finish this book?” she suggested.

He nodded, “Yeah there’s something I wanted to talk to you about anyway…”

She lead him back into her kitchen and pulled out a glass bottle of water out of the fridge and poured him some. He took it from her gratefully and took a sip as she took one from the reusable water bottle she seemed to always have with her.

“Are your family conservationists?” he asked.

She looked at him and laughed, “No, why?”

He pointed towards the water bottle, “I like the environment as much as the next guy but you seem to have that with you _always_.”

“You really ought to think of a career change,” she grinned, referencing her comment from last week when she’d told him he should become a therapist, “My family is _hugely_ wasteful. Perhaps I’m fighting against that… though… _excuse me_ … _‘I like the environment as much as the next guy’_ … didn’t I just read about your plans for making _all_ future building projects carbon neutral?”

He groaned, “You read that piece?”

She fixed him with a look and then framed her face, “If you saw _this_ face in the newspaper, wouldn’t _you_ read the article?”

“If I saw that face in an instruction manual _,_ I’d read it cover to cover,” he admitted.

_Did. I. Just. Fucking. Say. THAT?_

Her face, or rather, the pinkness of it told him that yes, he had. That he had in fact just flirted with her. There was nothing about that statement that could be construed as friendship. No. That had been flirting. Bad flirting, but flirting, nonetheless.

“Let’s move past that,” he brushed the air.

“We’re past it,” she sort of moved her whole body in a way that was so unusually awkward for her that it made it abundantly clear they weren’t. She tried though and said, “And of course I read it! It was wonderful. Brynden has such cheek though, I’m surprised you get anything done with him around.”

He chuckled, “It’s difficult I admit. But uh, yeah he mentioned he knew you.”

_And now it’s obvious you’re talking to your family about her. Well. Done._

This one didn’t seem to strike her as odd though and she smiled, “A little. Through the foundations I work with. He’s incredibly generous. There’s one for the specific type of cancer that Trystane had, that’s the one I work with most and I think a friend of his passed away from it.”

“Willem Darry,” Robb confirmed, the great great uncle of Wes’ classmate Celia. “I didn’t realize it was the same kind.”

She nodded, and shrugged, “Small world.”

“Yeah,” he agreed.

“So you wanted to talk to me about something?” she changed the subject, “Is it Halloween? Because I want to talk to you about that.”

“Oh, no it wasn’t,” Robb shook his head, and then realized that Halloween was the following Monday. He had to make sure to pick up candy when he went to the grocery store. Thankfully he already had Wes’ costume. He had Theon to thank for the fact that he was going as a hockey player and not a dragon. “It’s Wes’ birthday.”

“Oh,” she smiled, “Is it coming up?”

“It’s the 20th of November,” he told her. “Usually it falls over Thanksgiving or just about and Wes has never really had _friends_ before now so we usually just do something with our family, but I think I should do a birthday party this year.”

“Love a good bday bash,” she agreed, “How can I help?”

“Brainstorming,” he noted. “I’m thinking at the house, on the Saturday but am open to any and all suggestions.”

She nodded, “Prepare to be inundated with spreadsheets.” He chuckled and she smiled, “I’ll get thinking. In terms of guest list though, general kindergarten etiquette is that you should invite the whole class. Everyone might not come but… oh and you should be prepared that the parents will stay. Even if you don’t extend the invitation, so I’d have extra food and booze.”

“Booze?” he asked, “For a kid’s afternoon birthday party?”

She smirked, “This crowd would pregame PTA meetings if it wouldn’t get their kids on some sort of naughty list with the principal.”

He chuckled, “Okay. His whole class, which kind of makes it easier,” she nodded in agreement, “And extra food and booze for the parents.”

“O _oooh_ ,” her face lit up, “You should do a hide and go seek game. Or White Walkers or ooh…okay. Spreadsheets are coming your way.”

“You’re something else,” he told her, “But thank you. So, what about Halloween?”

“So the houses are too far apart around here and I don’t really like being out on the main road on Halloween…” she said.

“Good call,” he agreed, “It turns people into total lunatics. My neighborhood is pretty similar, but Old Town does it really well though, Wes and I usually go there. Would you guys want to come?”

She smiled, “We do Old Town too! And yeah we’d love to go around with you guys. My brother Gendry, I think I mentioned he’s coming in? He’ll be with us too if you don’t mind.”

Robb’s stomach clenched. Gendry, her older brother. It had been so long since he’d met someone’s older brother and cared. He knew that he shouldn’t care. They were just friends, but still, it felt like a big deal. Siblings always were.

Sansa after all had spotted what was still in the cradle between him and Ella from a mile away.

He found though, that he wanted to meet him. It was the sort of nerves that felt kind of good. The way you knew what you wanted as soon as you flipped a coin and risked leaving a decision up to chance.

“I don’t mind,” he offered as casually as possible, then asked, “Is he scary?”

She laughed, “Kind of.” Then shook her head, “No he’s a softy once you get to know him. A little like Jon though… not the most talkative.”

“Ah, well, broods are my bread and butter,” he agreed, and she offered him a toothy grin, “Are you dressing up?”

“Of course, I am,” she noted, “Cole and I are doing a couples’ costume.”

“Really?” he grinned, “What is it?”

“Daphne and Scooby-Doo,” she told him.

“That’s incredible,” he laughed. “Cole definitely has Scooby-Doo’s energy.”

“Totally,” she agreed. “Are you?”

“I don’t, usually,” he admitted, “Not sure what I’d be.”

“More spreadsheets coming your way,” she teased. Then noted, “Gendry _definitely_ won’t dress up so you’ll be in good company.”

“Wes is being a hockey player,” Robb noted, “Not really sure I could turn that into a couples’ costume.”

She laughed and then scrunched her nose, “Well hmmm you could go as a missing front tooth?”

He laughed, “How?”

“I’m the _brainstormer_ , remember?” she teased. “I leave the finer details to you.”

“Hmm, then jeans and a flannel it is,” he agreed.

“Oh yes, go as a lumberjack! You have the body for it.” Robb’s cheeks flamed and her mouth dropped open and then she immediately brushed the air, “Let’s move past it.”

“We’re past it,” he agreed, though, he certainly wasn’t.

She’d looked at his body. Ella Martell had looked at _his_ body. It was only fair, because he’d definitely looked at hers even though he’d tried desperately not to.

The doorbell rang and Ella breezed away from him towards it and he heard her greet what sounded to be Sophie’s Dad at the front door. Robb looked around her kitchen, trying to avoid the picture that his eyes always trailed to when he was in here.

It was Trystane and Ella, sitting at a picnic table. Neither of them were facing it though, they were sideways on the bench. Ella’s back was cradled in his chest. She had her eyes closed in laughter and Trystane was looking down at her with a smile.

His stomach clenched, seeing the absolute love between them. Knowing how many pictures he had with Jeyne where it was just as obvious.

“Sorry,” he said out loud to the empty kitchen.

Hoping, though he knew it was impossible, that at least one of them could hear him.

***

“Oh, AND ice skating,” Cole said from the backseat.

Myrcella smiled, “The rink isn’t open yet, baby. Maybe when Uncle Gendry comes back in the winter you can take him, alright?”

They had been planning for Gendry’s visit that weekend and Cole’s list of activities had gotten so long that even if Gendry did move back it’d take them a year to get through it. She was hardly better, having planned out every meal and stocked up on his favorite beer. She’d bought him new pajamas that were waiting on his bed. He would scoff at them but the next morning he’d come down wearing them, grumbling that he needed coffee and ever so subtly noting how soft they were.

“Okay then DEFINITELY the skate park,” Cole noted.

Myrcella bit her lip to hide her laugh as she pulled into the parking lot of the school. Gendry had gone through a major skateboard phase when he was younger, and she had his old board in the garage. He liked to take it out when Cole took his scooter, but the last time they’d gone to the skate park Gendry’d had to ice his knee for the rest of the weekend. That hadn’t stopped Cole from thinking the kickflip or whatever he’d done was the coolest thing _ever_.

She made no agreement on Gendry’s behalf and got out of the car and helped Cole. She tightened his raincoat around him, though it wasn’t yet drizzling the air was wet and they walked hand in hand towards the school.

A bunch of kids were already there and Sophie Grey and Celia Darry, hands clasped, cooed, “ _Hi Cooole_ ,” as soon as they entered the classroom.

He waved excitedly at them and tore off his raincoat to run over and say a proper hello. She grabbed it and his bag and walked it over to the coat room.

“Ella!” Wes greeted her, hugging her leg.

“Hi sweetheart,” she smiled, stroking is soft brown hair, “I had _so_ much fun with you yesterday.”

“Me too!” he looked up at her and grinned. “Daddy I’m gonna go see Cole.”

Before Robb could answer, Wes dashed out of the coat room, leaving just her and Robb in it. They weren’t quite as close as they had been last night when she’d stupidly taken his hand, but they were still pretty close and it was dark in here.

“Morning,” she greeted him.

“Morning,” he returned.

She hung up Cole’s things and then headed back into the bright safety of the classroom, feeling Robb at her heels.

It was unclear when exactly she’d started being so aware of him. When he was near her though she could feel his presence even if he wasn’t touching her. She tried to ignore it, but it was like trying not to feel the wind on your cheeks.

“Who’s that?” she asked, pointing to the woman standing near the blackboard.

“Substitute,” Robb answered, “Mr. Tarly is sick apparently.”

“Oh no,” Myrcella lamented, “I hope there isn’t something going around. The chicken pox took out Cole’s _whole_ preschool class one year.”

“Yeah I know,” Robb agreed, “Gilly’s still not doing well.”

“Poor thing,” she lamented, “Can you text me her address?”

He nodded, but asked, “Why?”

“I have this bone broth we were talking about in my freezer,” she said, “Does wonders for your immune system. I was going to defrost it and drop it off with some flowers or something.”

“Way to make me feel like a dick,” Robb teased, and she let out a surprised laugh. “But yeah, I’ll send it to you right now.”

She looked at him and realized he was in jeans. Usually he’d be in a suit at morning drop off.

“Did you have to take the day off work?” she wondered.

“No just working from home,” he said, “I’ll take a few hours in the afternoon but Wes is pretty good about entertaining himself while I’m on calls.”

She grimaced, “I would have picked him up.”

He looked at her as though he was about to demure and then nodded, his eyes softening, “Maybe tomorrow? If she’s still not doing well? I’m supposed to have a site walk-thru that I could move if necessary-“

“It’s not,” she cut in. “We would love to have Wes over. Will is going to be there too, so maybe Wes can help me keep him and Cole in line.”

Robb chuckled, “Always with the ulterior motives, eh?”

She shrugged, and teased, “Making it work.”

“That’d be great though,” he nodded, “I don’t really want Gilly to push herself and it’s the only afternoon that’s really a problem this week…”

“Don’t be afraid to ask, okay?” she asked him.

She could have said more. She could have told him that she loved his son, true feelings of love for him. That when Wes fell and scraped his knee, she felt it in the pit of her stomach, and when his face brightened at the sight of her it turned her whole day around. He’d snuck up on her, just like Robb had, but she didn’t bother resisting him in the same way. She could have told him that he could always ask. That he never had to. But she just left it there, wondering if he understood.

“Yeah,” he agreed, his blue eyes drinking her in, “Okay.”

Her phone buzzed with Gilly’s address and she and Robb said goodbye to the boys and then headed towards the front of the school. Unsurprisingly, while they’d been inside the skies had opened up and thick heavy raindrops were attacking the pavement.

“That substitute probably needs help…,” she joked.

Robb chuckled and looked down at her, “I thought the boys and I voted?”

She looked down at her black turtleneck and grimaced, “I know, I know. My jacket and umbrella are in the car.”

He nodded, “Very helpful there.” She laughed and he looked down at her and said, “You know, I _should_ let you fend for yourself. May teach you to bring your raincoat inside.”

She knew her voice was little less a coo than Sophie Grey’s had been when she asked, “But are you going to?”

He grinned at her, “Get your keys ready.”

She pulled them out of her bag and then suddenly she was underneath Robb’s arm and his raincoat all at once.

“Where are you parked?” he asked her casually, as though she could think about anything other than his solid arm around her shoulders or that clean smell emanating from him.

“Second row, to the left,” she said.

“Alright, here we go,” he grinned at her.

With that he pushed open the door and they sprinted down the steps. She wasn’t sure that the raincoat was doing much of anything for either of them considering it was open, but his body seemed to be getting the brunt of it as they raced to her car.

She unlocked it and pulled the door open and got inside and Robb hovered over her.

“Thank you,” she laughed, shivering as she turned on the car.

“You okay to drive in this?” he asked her.

She nodded, “Promise. Don’t float away on the way to your car.”

“See you at pick-up,” he grinned at her, “With your coat!”

“We’ll see,” she laughed, and he closed her door for her and sprinted away.

She had been meaning to go to the grocery store but they had more than enough in the house to get through dinner and breakfast and Cole’s lunch for the next day so she decided to push it off. She went home instead and did a few loads of laundry and answered some emails. When she was done with all of that she changed into a gauzy floral dress and her navy blue flats, smiling as the first hints of sun poked through the clouds.

The rain had completely stopped by the time it was time to head to her therapy appointment and her good mood hadn’t dissipated. Dr. Dayne greeted her at her doorway as always, wearing a beautiful pair of lavender trousers and a mauve silk turtleneck. They made her unusual violet eyes all the more startling.

“Hello Myrcella,” she greeted her.

“Hi Dr. Dayne,” she greeted her.

Her therapist ushered her into the office and Myrcella took her usual seat.

“So,” Dr. Dayne said. “Let’s start with the good.”

“I told Robb about Trystane,” Myrcella confessed instead.

To her surprise her therapist smiled and said, “Is that so?”

She nodded, “Do you remember last week? Robb and I had that little…thing or whatever?” Dr. Dayne nodded, “Well it was because it was the anniversary of his wife’s death.”

“Robb is a widower,” Dr. Dayne noted.

“Yes,” Myrcella agreed, surprised that she hadn’t mentioned that before.

“Well that certainly explains his behavior,” Dr. Dayne suggested and Myrcella nodded. “So, you two… discussed this, then?”

“He apologized to me and it sort of just… came out?” Myrcella confessed. “I’m sorry.”

Dr. Dayne’s brow furrowed, “Why are you sorry?”

“Because you’ve been trying to get me to tell that story for a month now, and I just blurted it all out to him instead,” she noted.

“Myrcella,” Dr. Dayne said gently, “I want you to be open to dealing with these things. And of course I’d like to help you do so, but if you think I am looking at you talking about Trystane with _anyone_ as anything other than a victory, then you are being far too hard on yourself. I’m very… proud of you.”

“Thank you,” she smiled and then leaned in conspiratorially, “I’m proud of me too.”

Dr. Dayne laughed, “How did it feel? Talking about all that’s happened.”

“In the moment, easy,” Myrcella admitted, “And then it was really draining, and then after that it was easy again.”

“So, it was easy while you were with Robb,” Dr. Dayne noted.

“To tell him, yes,” she agreed, “But then he told me about his wife and it was really overwhelming, so he took me home and I cried and cried and _cried_ and then slept. And then he and the boys picked me up and…”

“And it was easy again?” Dr. Dayne suggested.

To her immense surprise, she felt a tear on her cheek. Another followed close behind and she swiped at them.

_She made everything easy._

“Trystane always made things easy,” she told her. “He made everything easy.”

“That must have been a wonderful feeling,” Dr. Dayne suggested. “And it must have made everything all the harder when you lost him.”

“I know it must seem like I don’t miss him,” she said, “I just… I try not to think about him. Because I don’t know how to… in the right way.”

“In the right way,” Dr. Dayne repeated.

Myrcella nodded, tears flowing more freely from her eyes, “Without it hurting. I want to be strong for Cole, I _have_ to be strong for Cole, and if I let myself think about Trystane too often then…”

“Being strong is good,” Dr. Dayne agreed. “But do you know what’s better?”

“What?” Myrcella wiped her cheeks.

“Being happy,” Dr. Dayne told her. “And make no mistake, that is a process, and there isn’t any one way of doing so. But I’d like to help you find a way that works for you. If you’ll let me.”

“I’d like that,” Myrcella agreed.


	11. Chapter 11

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> okay so I have NO idea how this chapter got SOOO long but it did. It's like 90% Robb with some Myrcella at the end.

“So how did we do this week?” Dr. Selmy asked him.

“Better,” he nodded.

“My favorite word,” Selmy offered with a slight twinkle in his eye.

“I think last week caught me off guard because… I felt like I had been. Better, I mean. The first year was kind of a blur and the second kind of the same,” he noted, “But this year I feel like me and Wes have started getting on track and so when it hit this time around, I don’t know…”

“Well, is it possible that it is precisely because you _have_ been doing better that it felt so impactful?” Selmy asked. “I suppose what I mean is, perhaps it was farther to fall this time around because of all the progress you’ve made in your daily lives.”

“Well,” Robb considered it, “I certainly like that better than my version.”

“Which was…” Selmy prompted.

“Eternal despair, that sort of thing,” Robb joked, and Selmy chuckled. “But um, thanks, I’d really like to think that was the case, and I think maybe it is. But there’s… something about that that feels wrong.”

“Like perhaps you didn’t love her enough?” Selmy prompted. Robb grimaced and Selmy’s face softened, “This is completely _normal_. I haven’t determined whether you’re one of those patients that considers being normal helpful or not, but it doesn’t change the facts of it. Survivor’s guilt is real, Robb. And it doesn’t just manifest through _going_ on, but in _moving_ on, too.”

“I…,” Robb shook his head, “Yeah.”

“Go on,” Dr. Selmy suggested. “You can say whatever you want here. I’m only listening about 30% of the time.”

Robb chuckled, “And worth every penny.” Selmy’s eyes crinkled and Robb sighed, “Missing her is all I have left.”

Selmy nodded, “Yeah. That’s a bitch.”

“Excuse me?” Robb asked.

Selmy shrugged, “I can put it more eloquently if you’d _like_ , but that’s the crux of it. It’s a bitch, it’s a raw deal. You didn’t deserve it and she certainly didn’t. But I think you need to think about what you just said anytime you feel guilty for moving on. That there is a part of you, a big part of you, that would rather be _miserable_ missing her, than lose her entirely. That, my boy, does not sound like a deficiency of love to me. Does it to you?”

“No,” Robb admitted. “It doesn’t.”

“But you’re not convinced,” Selmy guessed. Robb stayed silent. “Because of Ella.”

“Not everything is about Ella,” Robb noted. “I had enough issues before she came along.”

“But she’s the reason you’re here,” Dr. Selmy reminded him, “Isn’t that what you said?”

“She may have…,” Robb tried to think of the right word, “Inspired me.”

Dr. Selmy’s eyes twinkled again, “Mmhm.”

“Calm down,” Robb chided.

Selmy chuckled, “Robb you’re what, thirty-three?”

“Thirty-four,” Robb conceded.

“And your best friends, are they married?” Selmy asked.

“One is, to my sister,” Robb noted, “The other is very much not.”

“The one who is very much not?” Selmy asked, “ _He’s_ the normal one.”

“So have you decided I’m one of those patients that _doesn’t_ want to be normal or are you trying to make me cry?” Robb wondered.

Selmy smirked, “I’m saying, you’re thirty-four. You are so young, though I’ll bet it’s been a while since you felt it. Jeyne’s life was _not_ meant to end when she was so young. But neither was yours. You can only do something about one of those facts.”

He couldn’t argue with that. It was only the other day that he’d thought that thirty-four didn’t constitute being old. There was no amount of new-age bullshit in the world that could make him believe that Jeyne had died _when her journey had ended_ , because her journey hadn’t ended. Her life had. It had been cut viciously short for no reason except a deer deciding to cross the street at the exact wrong moment. It was a punchline to the world’s worst joke.

“What if that’s not the only reason?” Robb asked. Dr. Selmy looked at him and he sighed, “There is that, I won’t deny it. I’m not saying you’re _wrong_ I’m just not sure it makes much of a difference to me at this point. But there is another thing… another reason.”

“What’s that?” Barristan asked.

“Losing Jeyne…,” Robb shook his head, his throat getting thick. “It almost killed me, too. You know, if it hadn’t been for Wes, if he didn’t need me. I don’t know where I’d be. And the idea of that. The idea of loving anyone that much ever again, what if something happened to them too? You know, I uh, even if it didn’t… the fear of that, of losing them… I… I just don’t know that I can handle loving someone that much again.”

“You can say her name,” Barristan said. “She’s not listening, no one is listening.”

Robb clenched his jaw, prepared to fight it because he really was sick of everyone being so sure of this.

_You get out of it what you put into it._

So, she was there, too. Always now in the back of his head. He might not be able to say it out loud, but it was getting too hard to deny to himself.

“Since Jeyne there has been no one,” Robb said, “I mean… there have been a few nights when I’ve gone out and…spent time with women that I never saw again,” he avoided Barristan’s smirk, “But I haven’t dated. Not even casually. And Ella isn’t the sort of woman I could casually date.”

“Why not?” Barristan asked.

“Because…,” Robb tried to think of a reason and then thought of thirty all at once, “She’s a widow? She’s the mother of my son’s best friend? We’re too good of friends? If she agreed to go out with you, you’d never date anyone else? I don’t know, she just isn’t. That’s not her _vibe_. And honestly, it’s not my vibe either. I’m not even the sort of person that says vibe. _They_ casually date.”

“If you had to guess,” Barristan said, “When was the last time you took a breath?”

Robb chuckled, “Probably around _widow_.”

“I thought it was later, ah well,” Barristan teased, then looked at him thoughtfully, “So fine. Don’t date her casually.”

“Yeah,” Robb groaned, rubbing his face. “Why do we end up here every session?”

“Why do you think?” Barristan asked.

“Don’t do that, you’re better than that,” Robb chided.

Barristan fixed him with a look, “And you’re a lot better off than you think. Oh, I could tell you we have years of issues to work through, it’s better for my retirement if I did, but we don’t. And I’m very happy to sit with you once a week for the next five years, but you _will_ get through this. I’m not trying to invalidate what you went through, or how it has changed you and your son’s lives irrevocably. But you’re going to be okay. As soon as you allow yourself to be.”

“Don’t retire before next week,” Robb pleaded.

Barristan chuckled, “No promises. If I win the lottery, you’re on your own.”

Robb laughed and agreed that made good sense. They talked a little more, but the truth was he really was feeling better that week. He’d gotten a ton of time with Wes, because Gilly was still sick, and he’d be picking him up from school in an hour. He never felt more okay than when he saw how okay Wes was.

They’d ended up staying for dinner at Ella’s last night, as she’d had the boys after school, and it had been nice. She’d made turkey burgers – though she let him grill them as he’d been pretty adamant that it was his one and only skill when it came to preparing food – and the best corn salad he’d ever had. He’d jumped on the trampoline with the boys and Wes had been so exhausted from his good day that he’d fallen asleep on the way home.

“Alright, my time is _up_ ,” he said at one thirty.

“Yes, it is,” Barristan agreed, “I’ll see you next week.”

Robb thanked him and headed out towards the parking lot. He had to pick up Wes in an hour and he had a meeting at two that he was calling in for so there was no point in going back to the house.

It was unseasonably warm and bright, so he went and got an iced coffee and a raspberry juice for Wes and then headed back to his car. He wasn’t sure how long the call would take so he decided to drive over to the school and parked so that he wouldn’t have to drive while on it.

To his surprise there were cars already in the parking lot. He dialed into his call and greeted everyone and then put himself on mute. Every time he was about to ask a question, Brynden asked it for him so Robb didn’t end up having to say anything.

“Thanks everyone, good weekends to you all,” he noted and then hung up.

He sent an email to himself to remind him to follow up on a few things and then got out of the car to go get Wes.

He crossed the parking lot and as he got onto the steps a young woman came over to him.

“Hi, you’re Robb Stark, aren’t you?” she asked.

“I am,” he held out his hand, “And you are?”

She was young, seemingly very young. Maybe twenty-one or twenty-two.

“Belinda Blanetree,” she shook his limply, “But my friends call me Lindy.”

The way she was looking at him made him want to call her Ms. Blanetree, rather than anything else. He tried to pass off a grimace as a smile.

She took it as such and said, “I’m Sophie Grey’s nanny.”

“Oh,” his smile turned genuine, “Sophie’s the _best_.”

“I know, what a sweetie,” she agreed, “Not like her brothers…,” she trailed off almost as though she couldn’t remember their names. Robb had met one of Sophie’s brothers. He was eight years old and an absolute _terror_ , though, a seemingly sweet one. She shook her head as though it was no matter and said, “She _loves_ your son Cole.”

“Wes,” he corrected her and then admitted, “But they’re always together at this point even I’m beginning to mix them up.”

Her face contorted in some sort of horror and then she started laughing. A loud, surprised, yelp, and she hit his chest as though it had been the funniest thing in the world.

It wasn’t that he was unused to female attention. He met women all the time and when they found out he was a widower he practically had to flee. Even still this was a bit much for 2:30 on a Friday afternoon.

“Wes, that’s right,” she went on, “Well she _really_ loves him.”

Robb gave her a tightlipped smile, “Well _Sophie_ is welcome any time.”

There was no way he was going to subject poor Gilly to this woman’s presence for the entirety of an afternoon. He vaguely remembered that Ella had spent one with her on Cole’s playdate at Sophie’s house. It was so like her not to have gossiped about it, though she’d probably been dying to.

As though he’d conjured her, Ella stepped onto the stairs and greeted them from below, “Hey Robb, hey Belinda.”

Clearly, she was not considered one of Lindy’s friends.

“Hi Melissa,” Belinda greeted her and Robb coughed to hide his laugh.

“Actually I need to talk to Ella about something _super_ important,” Robb noted and Belinda just stood there so he was more direct, “And _private_ so umm… we’ll just see you in there?”

Belinda looked between them and then headed into the school and Ella climbed up the rest of the stairs and pulled him over to the side of the door.

“What is it?” she asked with a furrowed brow, “Is everything alright?”

The worry on her face made his stomach clench and he hurried to assure her.

“Everything is totally fine,” he promised and watched as her face relaxed, “She’s just _a lot_.”

Ella smiled, “She thinks you’re _fine_.”

Robb felt his cheeks heat, “Don’t leave me.”

“Aww, poor baby,” she teased, hooking her arm through his, “I’m Robb Stark and _all_ the pretty nannies think I’m _dreamy_.”

He chuckled as he allowed her to pull him towards the school, trying not to focus on the fact that he hadn’t even noticed that Belinda was pretty, or how soft Ella’s skin felt against his.

“So all of them?” Robb asked her and Ella released his arm and then shoved it. He chuckled as he held open the door for her and tugged her under his arm, “Oh you know I’m teasing.”

She grinned up at him and he wondered if she wasn’t jealous even a little bit. It was a stupid, childish thought to have but it entered his mind, nonetheless.

“All of them,” she informed him, “And most of the Mommies. And some of the Dads.”

“Which Dads?” he wondered curiously, for some reason feeling especially flattered that he’d caught their attention.

She laughed and shook her head, “I’m not telling you that.”

“Fine, fine, fine,” he agreed, dropping his arm off of her and grabbing onto his hand so that he couldn’t be tempted to touch her further.

“So is Wes excited for the hockey game tomorrow?” she asked.

Robb nodded, “Yeah he doesn’t really know the difference between preseason and not so he’s _very_ excited. Theon is also very excited, though I’m 67% sure he knows the difference.”

She laughed, “Hockey… that’s the one on ice, right?”

“So I guess we won’t be seeing _you_ at the preseason games,” he noted. “When does Gendry get in?”

“Tonight, just before dinner,” she smiled, her entire body practically levitating. She confessed, unnecessarily but pretty adorably, “I’m so excited.”

It sounded like she saw Gendry far less than he saw Sansa. A few times a year, more similarly to him and Arya. Usually, he saw her when they were in the north, but on the occasions that she visited them here they rolled out the red carpet, planning days and days of activities.

They got into the classroom and their boys came over to greet them. Cole had fallen on the playground and was proudly sporting a band-aid on his knee and Wes had read in front of the whole class.

He let Wes get on his back as Ella and Cole walked hand in hand beside them. They were all talking about little nothings when all of a sudden Cole let out an inhuman sound and bounded down the steps.

“Cole!” Ella called, a slight panic in her voice and then followed him with her eyes.

She then let out an only slightly more dignified noise and bounded down the steps after her son. Robb looked at where they were going and saw Cole hop into the arms of a great oak tree. Ella followed a half-second later and the man caught her easily too, holding both of them in his arms.

Robb picked up the backpack Cole had discarded and Ella had forgotten and followed them down the stairs.

“Who is that?” Wes asked him.

“I don’t know, honey,” Robb’s stomach churned but he kept his voice light, “Let’s go find out.”

“ROBBBWESSSTHISISUNCLEGENDRY,” Cole informed them as they got down the stairs.

Robb’s stomach uncoiled though nerves landed there immediately and he smiled at the man who was still holding Cole and Ella off the ground.

“Robb,” Ella smiled, “Sorry we just took off,” and then turned back to Gendry, “We weren’t expecting this beast until tonight.”

“You know I hate to be predictable, Sprite,” Gendry noted. Then looked at him, “Gendry Waters.”

“Robb Stark,” he returned.

He would have offered to shake his hand but Gendry’s were occupied.

Gendry nodded, looking him over, “Robb Stark, huh?” Robb was not a small guy but Gendry had at least two inches and thirty pounds on him. His demeanor changed entirely when he looked at his son, “That must mean you’re Wes. I’ve heard you’re pretty awesome.”

“HE’S THE BEST,” Cole informed his uncle loyally.

“Hi,” Wes greeted Gendry, though Robb noticed his arms tightened around his neck.

Robb rubbed his back and pulled him around so that he was holding him at his hip. Gendry let Ella down but not Cole and Robb handed her his backpack. She blushed and thanked him and then the five of them stood their looking at one another awkwardly.

“Well, we should go,” Robb said, “I hope you guys have a great weekend together.”

“Wai-wai-wait,” Gendry stopped him. He looked at Cole and said, “You’re telling me I’m not going to hang out with your _best friend_ until Monday?” Gendry then looked at him and suggested, “Come over tomorrow.”

“Thanks but uh, we’ve got plans tomorrow,” Robb noted.

“We’re going to the hockey game!” Wes informed him proudly.

“Oh sweet you got preseason tickets?” Gendry asked and Robb nodded. Gendry was still looking at him and he said, “Well then tonight. For dinner. She always makes too much.”

“Says the man who cleans out my fridge every time he comes into town,” Ella teased. And then looked at him too, “But you guys should come over. We have more than enough, and we’d love to have you.”

Robb wasn’t entirely sure that was true. She didn’t really have much of a choice but to say that, now that Gendry had suggested it in front of their kids. To her credit she seemed to mean it though.

“Yeah come!” Cole pleaded.

“Can we Daddy?” Wes sealed it.

“We’d love to,” he agreed, “Can I bring anything?”

“Grey Wind!” Cole exclaimed.

Robb glanced at Ella and she smiled at her son and then looked at him, “We’re pretty big fans of his, too. Just yourselves and Grey Wind. Around six?”

He agreed and they all parted ways. Gendry slung Cole’s backpack over his shoulder and then his arm around Ella and he watched as they all headed towards her car. There was almost no family resemblance between any of them and yet they looked undeniably a family.

“Can we go for a bike ride, Daddy?” Wes asked.

Robb blinked away from the sight of Ella laughing at something Gendry had told her and turned to his son.

“Great idea,” he agreed, “I just have a call at four, but we can fit in a good bike ride before then.”

He brought them home and they both changed into better clothes and sneakers for the ride. It was a truly exquisite day, the last burst of warmth before the weather inevitably changed on the first of November as it always seemed to. They’d wake up and leaves would be on the ground amidst the silly string and discarded candy wrappers and masks. A night of technicolor giving way to a long, grey morning.

They took a ride along the river, which was crowded with others trying to take advantage of the day, and got back in time for him to settle Wes with a snack before he had to get on his call.

It was a slightly more involved one, some reassessing that was necessary and when he was done he went and check in on Wes. He found his son sitting on the couch, reading to Grey Wind.

“Piggy and Gerald?” Robb asked, “Grey Wind’s _favorite_.”

It had been Grey Wind over the summer that had given Wes the confidence to read. He had been so close, even though he wasn’t yet five, and they had practiced sounding things out. Grey Wind would come and lay with his head in his lap and Wes would stroke his head and all of a sudden the words would just smooth out, making it clear that it was his nerves rather than his ability holding him back.

_Like father, like son,_ a heartbroken laugh entered his mind.

His stomach clenched yet again. It was frustrating, how often he thought of her now. She seemed always on the tip of his tongue.

He listened as Wes finished the story and then his son grabbed another and handed it to him. Unlike Grey Wind, he was not partial to the Piggy and Gerald books, but he read it anyway and then they agreed that they should both shower.

By the time they’d done so it was time to head over so he piled them all into the car and drove the now familiar route to Ella’s house.

“What do you think Ella is making?” Robb asked Wes.

“Something _yummy_ ,” Wes noted.

Robb couldn’t help but agree. Everything Ella made was delicious. Though he felt sort of bad that they were honing in on her dinner, he couldn’t help but be a little happy they weren’t doing takeout or pancakes tonight.

Besides, more importantly, it seemed like Gendry wanted to get to know him. He certainly would if there was some guy around one of his sisters, especially if they’d been through what Ella had been, and though he wasn’t ready to start anything, and it didn’t seem like she was either, he wasn’t going to miss the opportunity to show him that he wasn’t a bad guy. It was clear how much he meant to Ella and the two of them would have enough working against them, a disapproving, protective, _enormous_ big brother didn’t need to be one of them.

He parked in behind the car that must have belonged to Gendry. It seemed like a rental though, the somewhat offensive blue on the generic model didn’t really seem like him. He helped Wes out of the car and followed along when his son ran to the front door. He went to open it but Robb reminded him to ring the bell. Wes looked at him like he was crazy but did it anyway.

Ella appeared a moment later wearing a long sleeved gauzy dress, her hair up revealing an obnoxiously elegant neck.

“Hey you, you crazy man,” she greeted Wes. “What did I tell you?”

“Daddy _made_ me,” Wes grumbled as though long-suffering.

Ella bit her lip to hide her smile and nodded, “ _Oh_ ,” then told him, “Just so you know, Wes is allowed to walk right in. If that’s alright with you.”

“It’s your house, you’ve got a right to have monsters roaming about,” he agreed and then took Wes’ cheeks and tilted his face back, “But everywhere else you ring the bell.”

“Yes Daddy,” Wes said dutifully.

She ushered them inside, letting Wes take her hand. He followed behind them and she turned with a smile.

“It’s too beautiful to be indoors, so I’ve set us up outside, I hope that’s alright,” she told him.

“That’s great,” he agreed, feeling the same way.

“Cole and Gendry are on the trampoline, if you guys want to join them,” she said.

“Yeaaaaa,” Wes agreed.

“Why don’t you go on out there, honey?” Robb suggested.

Wes ran out as though he very much did have the run of the place and he followed Ella into her kitchen. It smelled heavenly, _spicy_ , and his mouth watered.

“It smells great,” he told her.

“My sister-in-law’s salmon recipe,” she grinned as she went to the counter and started plucking herbs and putting them in a bowl of salad. “I’ve made a couple of milder pieces for the boys. I remember Wes eating fish but if he doesn’t like it I’ve got loads of other things.”

“He loves salmon,” Robb said and then grinned, “Just like all four year olds do.”

She laughed, “Yeah we are certainly raising a pair of weirdos. I have other things for you too if you don’t like it.”

He chuckled, “I eat everything, and your stuff is better than just about anything.”

She patted her hands on a dish towel and he could see a blush on her cheeks, “Let’s not forget Gilly. How’s she doing by the way? She texted me yesterday and thanked me again for the broth but I forgot to check in.”

“She’s on the mend,” he promised, “No temperature today but she’s just going to rest up this weekend.”

“Good, that’s great,” she smiled, and then glanced around, “Can I get you a glass of wine? We have both red and white open, or a beer?”

“I’ll have something with dinner,” he waved her off, “What can I do to help?”

She placed a hand on her hip, cocking it to the side and then tapped the index finger of the opposite hand against her lip, “I’m forgetting something.” She looked at him and narrowed her eyes and then grinned, “I just can’t remember what it is.”

“Did you set the table?” he asked.

“I set the table,” she confirmed.

“Did you turn on the oven?” he asked.

She laughed, “Yes I turned on the oven.” Then she looked around again, “Ooh! You genius.”

He was entirely sure that he did not deserve to be called that but he wasn’t going to correct her either. She went into the fridge and pulled out a glass jar with a peach colored, viscous liquid in it.

“Salad dressing,” she told him, and then went to take the cap off. Her brow furrowed, and her voice was a little tight when she said, “It’s homemade but…” she grimaced again trying to turn it, “It always gets sticky.”

“I’m good for more than just my genius mind over here,” he noted. She looked at him and he held his hand out for it, stepping towards her. She gave him the bottle and it stuck a little but came undone pretty easily. He handed it back to her, grinning when her lips popped open in annoyance, “Thank you for loosening it for me.”

She turned to scowl at him and then her face took on a breathtaking smile, “You’re _welcome_.”

He’d gotten some on his finger and he raised it to his lips. His palette was far too unrefined to know how many different flavors he was tasting, all he knew was that it was _good_. Like… take a bath in it good.

“ _You’re_ a genius,” he told her.

“Almost makes eating a salad for lunch everyday worth it, right?” she asked.

He pretended to think about it and said, “Maybe a salad… on the side of a sandwich.”

She laughed and moved by him to dress the salad. He felt pretty useless but he didn’t like the thought of her in here on her own making dinner for all of them while they hung out outside.

“Are you sure I can’t do anything?” he asked.

“Well…,” she said, looking around, “You don’t have to but… I was curious how… it’s going with Dr. Selmy? I totally get if you don’t want to talk about it but…”

“It’s going well,” he told her, “I really like him. He’s not at all what I expected. Doesn’t really stand on ceremony. But… I think we’re a good fit.”

“You have no idea how happy that makes me,” she told him, her voice full of a sincerity he didn’t doubt but that touched him nonetheless.

“And you? And Dr. Dayne?” he asked.

He knew that her start with her therapist had been a bit rougher than his. Likely she was right, he was more open to it. He thought she might have gone at the request of her cousin or sister-in-law, whereas it had been his decision fully. Ella held herself together so tightly though, she was a force unto herself, and letting someone else come in and shake it up would take time.

To his surprise though, a contented smile took over her face, “We’ve turned a corner. Or maybe I have? Thanks to you actually.”

“Me?” he asked.

She nodded though she wouldn’t look at him, “Our talk last week was a really big deal for me.”

“That’s…,” he started and she glanced up at him. “That’s a really big deal to me.”

She smiled gently, “Me too. So, Dr. Dayne and I have decided that I ought to be happy.”

“How odd,” he grinned, “Dr. Selmy and I came to that conclusion too.”

“That you think I should be happy?” she teased.

He chuckled, “Yes. Definitely.”

She blushed as though she heard the honesty amidst the teasing and then said, “You know what makes me _really_ happy?”

“What?” he wondered.

“Perfectly cooked salmon,” she grinned.

She turned away from him and went to the oven and opened it. She stood on her tiptoes to look at it and then let out some sort of delighted noise that he’d never heard before and hoped he’d never hear again for fear that he’d actually faint. She put on oven mitts and pulled out the tray of salmon.

“Are we happy?” he asked.

She turned with a smile and set the tray down and then picked up a spatula and lifted one piece.

“Oh we’re very very happy,” she agreed. “Do you mind bringing that dish over?”

He grabbed the one she was gesturing to and she scooped piece after piece onto it and then lifted the pan and drizzled the sauce over top.

“Mommy Mommy Mommy,” Cole ran into the kitchen, “Uncle Gendry did a FLIP!”

“He _did_?” Ella asked, “Uncle Gendry’s going to be icing his hip tomorrow.”

“Uncle Gendry can hear you,” Gendry said as he came inside and Robb bit the inside of his cheek to hide his smile when Ella’s eyes widened. “And I can still outsprint you.”

“Robb,” Ella said, “Would you say that someone’s legs being eight inches longer would help them get somewhere quicker?”

Ella and Gendry both turned to look at him and he thought about how best to answer. On the one hand, she was right. On the other hand, Gendry hadn’t decided he liked him yet.

“I mean…,” he said and then thought about the first dinner he’d had with Ella and Cole and shrugged, “Science.”

She giggled and Gendry gave him a bemused expression before grabbing the tray Ella had been preparing.

“Wes, Cole,” he said, “Let’s get you washed up.”

The boys ran down the hall to the powder room and Robb went and took the salad bowl off of the counter. Ella stopped him with a hand to the middle of his back, which she removed quickly, and then placed two serving utensils in it. She thanked him and Gendry nodded his head outside so he followed behind.

Her backyard had a large stone patio and there was a table set up at the end of it, twinkly lights hanging, glittering in the dusk.

“Wow,” he said when he saw the table.

“Yeah, Sprite doesn’t really do the whole _casual_ thing,” Gendry noted.

Robb smirked, because Ella absolutely did do the casual thing. Everything was always delicious, but the night before they’d eaten at her little breakfast nook and just had popsicles for dessert. They were homemade, but still. Clearly though, she pulled out all the stops when Gendry was in, pampering him the way Sansa always did when he and Wes came to visit. It was Jon’s favorite time of year and it had little to do with their company.

He wasn’t about to correct Gendry on his sister though so he said, “Sprite?”

He’d noticed Gendry had called her that at the school too.

Gendry nodded and scratched his cheek, “Yeah we didn’t grow up together and when I started coming around, she was this skinny limbed, wide eyed _creature_ flitting about that I had absolutely no idea what to do with.” He chuckled, and Gendry admitted, “Still don’t half the time.”

“I hear you,” Robb agreed, “I’ve got _two_ of them, though one is all wolf.”

Gendry smirked, “Poor bastard. Let me get you a drink.”

Robb was about to answer when Ella came out holding yet another dish with Wes and Cole on either side of her, the three of them chattering happily about something.

“What can I get you to drink?” Ella asked.

“Whatever’s open,” he suggested, taking the bowl from her and bringing it over to the table.

“White’s here, red’s inside,” Gendry noted.

“White it is,” Robb agreed.

Everyone settled into the table and started passing things around. In addition to the salmon and salad, Ella had made some sort of cous-cous thing that Wes seemed to recognize. He was sitting next to Cole so he started cutting his salmon for him.

“Did you just -,” Gendry asked.

“No,” Ella said quickly. Too quickly.

“I definitely-“ Gendry started again.

“Shush,” Ella ordered, holding her arms out and then looked up.

Just like that a crack of lightning predicted the sudden, heavy drops of rain that started to fall.

“Told-“ Gendry started and then stopped talking when Ella glared at him.

The rain came down with a vengeance. He hadn’t even seen the clouds come, but that happened sometimes with dusk, the purple grey disguising them. Salvaging dinner was a choice of the past, pieces of lettuce were already floating on Cole’s plate.

“Run,” Ella suggested.

Cole and Wes started screaming and laughing and rather than run towards the house they ran away from it.

“Wes,” he called, but he was laughing because you would have thought they’d been in a draught the way they were running around with their tongues out, primed to catch raindrops.

“Cole, baby, come on,” Ella laughed too.

“CATCH ME MOMMY,” Cole suggested.

Then, in help to absolutely no one, Gendry declared in a monster voice, “I’M.GOING.TO.GET.YOU.”

“NOOOOOO,” Wes and Cole shrieked in tandem, running further away.

“Come on,” Ella suggested and she ran towards the house.

He followed after her, knowing Wes was only in danger of soaking through his clothes. She was laughing as she got into the kitchen and he was too.

“An outdoor dinner in the Riverlands, what was I thinking?” she asked.

“I don’t know,” he told her truthfully, “But it was a nice thought, whatever it was.”

She turned around and smiled, and the light caught behind her. Her hair was soaked through and her dressed had started to cling and it had been far too long since he’d seen anything quite so beautiful.

He stepped closer to her, unsure of why he was doing it except that he couldn’t seem to stand the distance.

Her eyes widened and he wasn’t sure if she was a sprite or a nymph but she was some sort of unknowable creature.

Gendry busted through the doorway with Cole and Wes each under one arm and he and Ella backed away from each other. 

“By the gods,” Ella laughed breathlessly, as Gendry set them down, “Don’t move a muscle.”

The boys dramatically froze and Ella disappeared and then came back with a large beach towel. She draped it around them both and then pulled them together, kneeling down on the floor as she rubbed their backs and arms.

“Little icicles,” she cooed at them.

Cole held out his hands and Wes did the same and Ella leaned down and blew hot air onto them. The boys rubbed them together and then held them out again, as though this was something they did often, which for all he knew it was. Wes’ wet forehead fell against Ella’s and she pulled them both closer.

“Huggle huddle,” she told them, and the boys giggled and got even closer to each other and to her.

Gendry cleared his throat and Robb glanced up quickly, their eyes meeting. He hadn’t realized he was staring but it was kind of hard not to. And it wasn’t just her it was them, the three of them, together. He had the oddest desire to wrap them all in his arms.

“Okay, we’ve got to get you monsters into some dry clothes,” Ella said and stood up, “And me too.”

“ _Yep_ ,” Gendry agreed and Ella scoffed at him.

She turned towards him, “Are you alright?”

He was pretty wet but not soaked through and besides he didn’t have anything to change into and Gendry certainly wasn’t going upstairs to change.

“I’m good,” he assured her.

“Well, I’ll go get the three of us sorted,” she said, “Why don’t you guys order pizza?”

She and the boys disappeared up the back stairs and he turned to Gendry.

He was pulling out his phone and said, “I’ll order from Sal’s.”

Robb tried to hide his grimace but he couldn’t. Sal’s _sucked_. It was written up in all the _Best of_ but that was only because they had a big wood burning pizza oven in the center and lots of pro athletes and celebrities were photographed there having casual meals. It was overpriced and the pizza always tasted burnt and they didn’t use nearly enough cheese and-

“We should order from Fred’s,” Robb coughed. Gendry stared at him and Robb shrugged, “I uh… know Sal’s is famous and all but it sucks. So. We shouldn’t order from there.”

Gendry took a long look at him, “That was a test,” he informed him, going into the fridge and then pulled out a beer and held it out, “And you passed with _flying fucking colors_.”

Robb let out the breath he’d been holding and chuckled, taking the beer and twisting off the cap, “Had me going there for a minute.”

Gendry shrugged, “An older brother’s prerogative.”

“Fair enough,” Robb agreed, holding out his beer. Gendry cheersed it with his own and they both took sips. “What do you think, two?”

“What are you going to eat?” Gendry joked and then dialed Fred’s.

He ordered three large pizzas and Robb whispered _salad_ knowing that Ella would want some. Gendry pointed at him as though he was a genius and ordered it and then gave the guy the address.

“Twenty minutes,” Gendry shook his head, “You can’t get to a pizza place in twenty minutes in King’s Landing. Too many fucking people.”

“It’s the worst place in the world,” Robb agreed.

“Tell me about it,” Gendry noted and Robb grimaced, remembering that he had to live there. “Can’t wait to get back here.”

“Oh? Are you moving back?” Robb asked.

Gendry shrugged, “We’ll see how this week goes. I think I should be able to, and if not through my company there’s some contract work with the Frey’s but I don’t know, they give me the creeps.”

“Yeah dude,” Robb agreed, “It’s not cool for me to say it, but I wouldn’t.”

Gendry nodded, “Yeah they’ve approached me a few times but none of the women there will look you in the eye. It’s like they’re afraid of what you’re gonna do. It’s fucked.” Gendry shrugged, “But I’m talking to my boss about a transfer. So, we’ll see.”

“Well, that’d make Ella pretty happy,” Robb noted. “I’m sure she doesn’t like to pressure you or anything but uh… every night here isn’t outdoor feasts with twinkly lights, if you know what I mean.”

“No she wouldn’t…,” Gendry looked at him, as though he’d just told him the sky was red. “Is she kidding me? I’d eat fast food on the floor with them. She’s _impossible_.”

“She’s incredible,” Robb defended her and reminded him, “And you know it.”

“Well it seems like you do, anyway,” Gendry noted, shifting gears very quickly.

“I deserve that,” Robb sighed, because he’d been anticipating it.

“I’m not going to give you a hard time,” Gendry promised. “Anyone with eyes can see you’re not looking to take advantage of a lonely woman.”

“Yeah uh, no,” Robb agreed, “We’re just-“

“Don’t bullshit me when I’m being cool about it,” Gendry warned.

Robb chuckled, “No I wasn’t going to say friends. We just aren’t ready. Either of us. My wife…”

Gendry nodded, “She told me. I’m sorry.”

“Thank you,” Robb gave him a tight-lipped smile.

“She seems different,” Gendry noted, “I don’t know. Lighter. Younger, maybe. That got anything to do with you?”

Robb shook his head, “I honestly don’t know. Can I… you can tell me to fuck off but uh, can I ask something?” Gendry took a sip of beer and gave him a wary nod. Robb took a deep breath and asked, “What was he like?”

Gendry swallowed and tilted his head back and forth, thinking about it, “I wanted to hate him. Sprite had dated before but all these… chumps.”

“I think she used the term shy,” Robb smirked.

Gendry laughed, “She can use whatever term she wants but they were chumps. Absolute lapdogs for her, I don’t know, maybe she craved the stability or whatever. Her par-well anyway. She’d dated these guys but none of them were it, you know? It was obvious how much they bored her, and then Trystane came along. And when I tell you that girl’s head spun. So, I was pretty fucking wary. And he was a playboy, he’d left his fair share of broken hearts. So I show up to meet him and she’s all starry-eyed smiles and I’m you know, grunting basically,” Gendry grinned as he laughed, “And I took one look at him and… I saw it.”

“Saw what?” Robb asked.

Gendry looked at him, “He was more of a sucker for her than any one of those chumps. I’d never seen a guy more in love. But he was himself too. He made her wilder, freer. She’d always been miss goody two-shoes –“

“Smarty pants, front of the class, offering to help the teacher,” Robb noted.

“Exactly,” Gendry agreed, “And she still was, you know but I don’t know with him it was like… she didn’t need the rules. I guess. I don’t know how to describe it. I think… shit this is just my first beer too,” Gendry said and shook his head, “I think for a really long time she felt like she had to be perfect to deserve to be loved. Her family’s just like that. And I think he gave her the confidence to, you know, not have to be perfect. Because she knew his love wasn’t going anywhere.” Gendry looked at him, “I don’t know if I answered your question.”

“You didn’t,” Robb deadpanned and Gendry chuckled, Robb shrugged, “But you did. He really was that guy.”

“That fucking guy,” Gendry shook his head, smiling a sad smile.

“I’m sorry,” Robb said. Gendry raised his eyebrows, and Robb shrugged, “You lost him too.”

***

“Do you want another beer?” she asked Robb.

He’d only had the one but shook his head, “No, I’m good, thanks.”

She nodded and stood up, holding out her hand for it but he waved her off. She took Gendry’s instead and the boys’ cups and brought them into the kitchen. He walked in behind her, silently, but she could feel him.

Robb had such a presence, or maybe she was just too attune to him, but she could always feel him.

He took Gendry’s beer from her and dropped it in the recycling along with his bottle as she rinsed the boy’s cups.

“I’m sorry,” she told him. She’d been wanting to tell him all night.

“I’m the one who is sorry,” Robb sighed, “You went to so much trouble.”

“Oh,” she turned around and shook her head, “That’s okay. But that’s not what I meant.”

Obviously, the dinner she’d planned getting rained out hadn’t been ideal but she’d sort of deserved it. An outdoor dinner in the Riverlands was a sign of great hubris and she’d read enough myths to know that things never ended well for those who possessed it.

“Then for what?” his brow furrowed, his red bottom lip pouting slightly.

She glanced away from it and smoothed her sweater, “For not inviting you tonight.”

Robb nodded once, “Again, I think I should be apologizing to you.”

She smiled and shook her head, “No, no I’m glad Gendry invited you. I should have. You were so kind when you invited Cole and I when Jon and Sansa were in.”

“You invited us trick-or-treating,” Robb noted and then looked at her, “And there’s no tit-for-tat. I invited you because…”

“Sansa asked you to?” she reminded him.

“Sure,” Robb agreed, “Let’s go with that.”

Warmth flooded through her entire body but she felt it pool in her cheeks, among other places. She felt her back against the counter and wished that she could move away further for fear that if they got any closer she’d close the distance entirely.

She’d meant what she’d said last week. She wasn’t ready. But sometimes, when she was with him, she felt like she could be.

He was dangerous. He made her feel comfortable with all sorts of things, a bizarre sort of confidence that made her brave or foolish. It made her confess things and want things, him, most of all.

“I…” she started and his blue eyes rested on hers. She glanced away and her eyes fell to the picture of her and Trystane that had been taken the day before he proposed. She straightened up, a bucket of cold water dropped on her and explained, “I only get to see him a few times a year, and I was being greedy.”

Robb smiled, “He’s your brother. You get to be greedy with him. You don’t have to include me and Wes in everything.”

_You really don’t have to worry about being an intrusion with us._

She’d lost count of how many times she’d replayed that in her head. He’d said it like it was obvious, like he had no idea how much it meant to hear it, though she didn’t doubt his sincerity. She’d tried, since then, to show him that it was the same. But he was so much better at being open than her. It just came naturally to him.

“But I want to,” she stretched her muscle. Robb looked at her and she felt her voice get small, “It’s better. When you guys are around. Everything is better.”

“Better,” Robb noted, and then smiled almost to himself. He looked at her then and nodded, “Yeah.”

“Robb can I…,” she started and then shook her head.

“Ella?” Robb prompted. “You can ask me anything.”

“Not this,” she demurred, grabbing the cups out of the sink and putting them in the dishwasher.

“I know what _anything_ means, Ella,” Robb noted.

She straightened up, but she couldn’t turn around. She couldn’t look at him when she said this. Asked this. It was childish, nothing more than a promise ring of a declaration.

“You know how we said, or I guess we implied,” she corrected herself, “That we weren’t ready?”

Robb was silent for a moment before he said, “Yes.”

His voice had gone so low that it made her shiver.

“Would you…,” she started, closing her eyes, “Would you maybe tell me. When you are. Even if I’m not I… I’m sorry.”

“You want me to tell you when I’m ready?” he asked.

“I know it’s lame and selfish,” she agreed.

“Can you please look at me?” he asked her.

It took all of the courage she had in her entire body to turn around and look up at him. He looked murderous or ravenous or _something_ and she felt like a child standing in front of a titan.

“I shouldn’t have asked,” she admitted. “I just… wouldn’t want to miss my chance.”

He shook his head, “You can’t _honestly_ be asking me that.”

“I know, I know,” she groaned, “I’m sorr-“

“No, Ella,” he laughed, “Whenever I’m ready… it’s… it’s only going to be for you.”

“Me?” she laughed.

He nodded, “Not for nothing, but you’re _literally_ the only person in the world who hasn’t noticed that…”

Her entire body was humming and she felt like she was spinning but she said, “Well… there’s Belinda.”

“Oh Lindy?” Robb asked, “I’ll tell her Monday.”

She laughed and cupped her cheeks in her hands, “I’m embarrassed.”

He shrugged, “I’m not.”

She knew that she was grinning like a fool but he looked rather foolish himself.

There was nothing that she could say that wasn’t going to sound stupid in that moment, which was just as well because Gendry came in.

“That,” he announced, “Is a heartwarming film.”

Robb turned to him, “A boy and his dragon, a tale as old as time.”

He was so much cooler than she was. His voice sounded measured, whereas she wasn’t entirely sure hers wouldn’t come out as a squeak if she tried to say anything.

Gendry gestured behind him, “The boys are asleep.”

“I should get Wes back,” Robb noted. He turned to look at her, “Thanks for dinner… both of them,” he teased and she laughed. He looked at her for another moment and nodded, “And yeah, I will… if you will too.” She nodded in agreement and then he turned to Gendry, “Thanks for inviting me, man. I’ll see you Monday. Don’t dress up or you’ll make me look like an ass.”

“I thought you were going as a lumberjack?” Gendry asked and Robb turned and narrowed his eyes at her. Gendry looked at her too, “You little shit.”

She shrugged, “I thought that’s what was agreed.”

They both chuckled at her because it must have been pretty obvious that she was lying. They followed Robb back into the living room. He leaned over the couch and stroked Cole’s curls briefly before he picked up Wes and cradled him in his arms.

They walked him to the door, and she opened it for him, and he thanked her again. She closed the door behind them and then leaned her back against it.

Gendry was there looking at her and it was like he could see right into her very soul.

“I like him,” he told her simply. “And you know who else would’ve?”

“Gendry,” she chided.

“Okay,” he agreed, “I’m sorry. But he would’ve. And I don’t know if that makes things better or worse for you but it’s the truth.”

She couldn’t argue with him. It had been something she’d tried not to think about, but it had nagged in the back of her mind. There were few similarities between the two, but Trystane would have liked Robb.

“He loved you more than I’ve ever seen anybody love anyone,” Gendry said, “And he made you _so_ brave. Just think how much he’d hate to know you were hiding behind him now.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Sooooo a few things:
> 
> 1) I'm not sold on the nickname 'Sprite'. Usually I have Ella's nickname be Doe but with Jeyne's death being caused by a deer I didn't like that VERY inadvertent (unintentional and seriously SO NOT A THING) symbolism so I changed it. if anyone has a better suggestion for a nickname I will absolutely go back and change it. (Yes, I know that I could have just not had him have a nickname for her but I did).  
> 2) I'm a pretty fragile writer so please be gentle, but I would love to know how people are feeling about the pacing. I don't want to rush them and have it feel inorganic or suddenly *too* fluffy? Idk.
> 
> The next chapter will be almost if not all Myrcella's POV.


	12. Chapter 12

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Oooh another long one! This is mostly from Myrcella's POV with Robb at the end.

“So, what else is going on?” Margaery asked in a breathless voice.

Her sister-in-law liked to call her when she was on her exercise bike. As a wonderful mom, a doting wife and fashion exec, she was big into multi-tasking and they hadn’t been able to talk last week much because Gendry had been in.

“Not _too_ much,” Myrcella said.

She had her on speakerphone and was cleaning out the fridge. As a single mom she also was big into multi-tasking.

“We had a great time with Gendry,” she noted, “He said you invited him to Thanksgiving?”

“Of course I did,” Marg panted, “He’s Tommy’s brother. Besides your mother isn’t coming. None of the Lannisters are this year.”

“I thought Uncle Jaime was still considering it,” Myrcella argued.

“Did he not call you?” Marg asked, “That _fucker_. I told him he had to tell you.”

“It’s fine, Marg,” Myrcella waved her off though she couldn’t see her. She dumped some juice down the drain and rinsed the glass bottle. “I think I owe him a call.”

“Don’t cover for him,” Marg admonished. “But anyway, yes, I invited Gendry.”

“Thank you,” Myrcella smiled, “We rarely get to see him two months in a row.”

“I know, and I figured you and Tommy could use a bit more family at the table but honestly it’s for Renly,” Marg agreed, “I think he’s sick of the Tyrells.”

Myrcella laughed, “You know he loves your family. Are they all coming?”

“ _All_ ,” Marg agreed, and she could practically hear her gritting her teeth, “If I don’t uninvite them that is. Loras is being such a backseat planner, I don’t know how Renly handles him. Garlan and Leonette are fine though if she sends me one more recipe for low fat gravy I’m going to force feed her lard,” Myrcella giggled and Marg let out a throaty chuckle, “And then my parents and Granny and… Willas.”

“Marg,” Myrcella chided as she tossed a few smooshed blueberries into her compost bin.

“He’s my eldest brother,” Margaery pointed out, “Of course he’s coming to Thanksgiving. And you know, I’m not responsible for where people sit.”

“You sent me place card options,” Myrcella reminded her, “You’re very much in charge of where everyone sits.”

The third summer after Trystane had passed, she and Cole went and spent two weeks in Highgarden with Tommen and Margaery and her niece. They’d had a lovely time, spending days by the sea and nights in the gardens. Willas had come the second week. He’d recently gotten divorced and suddenly Myrcella found that everywhere she went, he was too.

To his credit, it had seemed like he’d been just as surprised to be there as she was to find him, suggesting a larger conspiracy at play. Even still, she had minded it in a way that he clearly hadn’t.

There was no real reason to. Like all the Tyrell’s he was handsome and charming, and like his sister he was intelligent and kind, too. Even still she’d felt nothing for him apart from a sort of muted, familial affection.

Margaery had told her that she just wasn’t ready. It had been hard to argue with her when she said _you have no idea if he’s the guy or not because you’re not ready to meet the guy_. So even though she’d disagreed, the logic employed had backed her into a corner. Now though, she knew for certain that Willas Tyrell never would be the guy.

As though she’d conjured him, her phone beeped indicating another incoming call. _Robb Stark_ showed on her caller ID.

“Is that you or me?” Marg asked.

“Me,” Myrcella said.

“Take it, I’m about to go up a hill anyway,” Marg lamented, “I’ll talk to you later this week.”

Myrcella agreed and clicked accept.

“Hey Robb, sorry I was on the other line,” she answered.

“That’s okay,” he said, though a chill ran down her spine. Something in his voice suggested that nothing was. “I’m sorry to uh, ask this, but…”

“You can ask me anything,” she repeated his words to her, meaning them as he had.

“I just got a call from the hospital, my Great Uncle Brynden collapsed on the golf course…,” Robb said and Myrcella’s heart plummeted. “I’m his emergency contact and they…want me down there…”

“I’m so sorry,” she told him uselessly. “And of course you should be there. We’ll take Wes.”

“Thanks uhm… I’m sure he’ll be fine but uh… fuck, sorry,” Robb broke off for a minute and her heart ached for him, “I hate to disrupt your Saturday but I really try not to bother Gilly on the weekends…”

“I’m happy to stay with Wes as long as you need,” she assured him, “Don’t give it another thought.”

“I can drop him off on my way to the hospital,” Robb suggested. “Thank you, Ella.”

“Of course but -,” she started.

“Oh sorry are you out right now?” Robb asked.

“No, no,” she promised, “I just… he’s probably a little freaked out and besides you have Grey Wind too. I don’t want you worried about getting back for him… why don’t Cole and I come there? We can get in the car in five minutes.”

“That,” Robb started and then paused, “Yeah I think that’d actually be better if it isn’t too much of a hassle.”

“We’ll be there soon,” she assured him.

“Don’t speed,” he pleaded.

“We’ll be there as soon as we can driving the speed limit and obeying all traffic laws,” she amended and she actually heard him let out a pained chuckle. She wanted to say something, anything, that could be helpful, but she wasn’t sure that anything could. “I’m… here.”

“Yeah,” he agreed, “Had a feeling you would be.”

They hung up and she went into Cole’s room where he was playing with legos and told him that they were going to stay with Wes and Grey Wind. He was disappointed that Robb wasn’t going to be there too but didn’t question it when she grabbed his backpack and put some pajamas, a change of clothes and his toothbrush in it.

She went and threw a change of underwear and a sweater and her toothbrush and a few other things in her handbag and grabbed the knitting she’d started by the side of her bed.

Cole was waiting for her in the hall and they went downstairs and out the front door.

“Why are we going there?” Cole asked curiously as she got him buckled in.

“Robb has to go take care of something,” she told him, “So we’re going to stay with Wes and Grey Wind while he does.”

Cole took that at face value and she got into the car and pulled down the drive. Her mind was going a million miles a minute. She felt terrible for Robb, knowing how important Brynden was to him. She’d never heard him sound like that. Not even when he’d been talking about his wife and unborn child.

“Baby,” she said to Cole as she drove towards the Starks’ house. “Robb… is going to be a little preoccupied. And Wes may be a little sad. So, we just need to be gentle, today, okay?”

“Why is Wes sad?” Cole asked.

She wasn’t entirely sure what Robb would have told Wes and she didn’t want to put Cole in a position to either lie to him or be the one to deliver the news.

“We’ll see if he wants to talk about it,” she said, “But let’s just go in there quietly and see how they are doing, okay?”

“Okay Mommy,” Cole agreed sweetly.

It was a short drive over to Robb’s and she got Cole and their things out of the car and rang the front doorbell. He answered a moment later, his face as white as a sheet but his eyes alert.

“Hey,” she greeted him.

“Thanks for coming,” he tried for a smile and she squeezed his arm to let him know he didn’t have to. “Hey Cole.”

“Hi Robb,” Cole greeted him and then stepped forward and hugged his leg. “I’ll cheer Wes up.”

Robb looked down at him and his hand went to Cole’s curls, stroking them gently and letting out a shaky breath.

“I know you will,” he told him gently.

She rubbed Cole’s back, “Come on baby, why don’t you go find him.”

“He’s in the living room,” Robb told him and Cole walked off, not running as he usually would. “Some kid,” he shook his head and she gave him a tight lipped smile, “I don’t know how long I’ll be gone. There’s some food in the fridge but uh-“

“I’ll figure it out,” she promised. “Don’t worry about anything here except…how much does Grey Wind get fed?”

“Three scoops,” he said, “But Wes knows the drill. I’ll have my phone on, and I think I’ll just be waiting around most of the time so… don’t hesitate to reach out.”

“I won’t, but we’ll be fine,” she told him, “Promise. Does Wes know?”

“Just that he’s in the hospital,” Robb said, grimacing, “My phone was on speaker… He’s okay but uh…”

She nodded, “Okay. You should go…”

“Yeah,” Robb agreed, “Come on in, I’m just going to say goodbye to Wes.”

She followed him in, closing the door behind her and they walked into the living room. Cole and Wes were sitting on the floor with Grey Wind, talking quietly as Dragon Tales played in the background.

“Hi sweetheart,” she greeted Wes, “Thanks for letting us come over.”

“Hi Ella,” Wes offered glumly.

Robb went and crouched down, “Alright honey, I’m going to go make sure they’re taking good care of Uncle Brynden, okay? Will you be a good boy for Ella? And make sure Grey Wind is too?”

“Yes Daddy,” Wes promised dutifully.

“Anything you want me to tell him for you?” Robb asked.

Wes shook his head, his lower lip trembling, “I can’t think of anything.”

Robb stroked his hair and seemed at a loss for words. She didn’t want to encroach but she stepped forward and got down on the floor.

“That’s okay,” she told him, “How about for now your Daddy just tells him that you love and miss him and want him to get better? And we can brainstorm while your Daddy’s gone and I’ll text him when we think of the _perfect_ thing to say?”

Wes looked at her, a small hopeful smile on his face, “Okay.”

“That’s a great plan,” Robb agreed, and her heart broke from the cheer he was forcing into his voice. “Love you, honey, I’ll see you soon.”

“I love you too Daddy,” Wes agreed, hugging him.

Robb held him tightly and then released him, and spared a gentle stroke to Cole’s hair before getting up.

She followed him to the door and he turned around, opening his mouth as though to say something else but nothing came out.

“Go,” she nudged gently, “The phone works both ways, remember? If you forgot anything just text me. We’ll be _fine_.” She then looked at him, and couldn’t help but ask, “Are _you_ okay to drive?”

He nodded, his eyes crinkling and then stepped forward. She’d never realized just how big he was until he was all but surrounding her.

His lips were gentle against her cheek but they burned all the same, his hands engulfing her upper arms.

“Thank you,” he repeated unnecessarily.

She nodded, not quite trusting her voice in the moment to come out as anything remotely dignified, and he released her quickly, turning and walking towards his car. He got in it and she saw him pause for a moment before starting his car and driving off. She didn’t close the door until his car turned onto the main road and then she took a deep breath and went into the living room.

It was just after four, and there were still a few hours of daylight left. It had rained earlier but dried since and she went back into the living room to see if she could get the boys outside.

“How are we doing in here?” she asked them.

“Okay,” Wes said.

Cole turned and looked at her and shook his head. She crossed the room and sat down, pulling Wes into her lap.

“It’s a little scary, huh?” she asked. Wes nodded against her neck. “Well the important thing to remember is that he’s with doctors who try _so so_ hard to get people better.” She didn’t want to make any promises because she had no idea what Brynden’s body was going through and the last thing she wanted was to lie to him. “So, I think what we have to do is all just think _really really_ good thoughts and trust that they are going to do everything they can, alright?”

“Okay,” Wes agreed, burrowing into her.

“Okay,” she stroked his hair, “Do you want to go play outside? Maybe ride your bike a little bit?” Wes shook his head. She looked at Cole and thought about what he liked to do when he was upset. “Well um… what if I make some popcorn and we all get cozy and watch a movie?”

Wes lifted his head up and looked at her and nodded.

“How about a huggle huddle first?” she asked.

A small smile appeared on his face and she smiled back, opening her arms to Cole who dove into them. Little limbs wrapped around her and she swayed them back and forth, kissing Wes’ warm temple.

“Alright boys, you two decide what we’re going to watch and I’ll go find the popcorn,” she told them.

She got up and went into the kitchen and into the pantry. The popcorn was easy to find. They had both kinds, the microwavable and the stovetop. She knew the latter took longer but it always tasted better so she grabbed that and a pot and some canola oil. She poured everything in and turned on the stove and went back into the kitchen.

“Any ideas?” she asked.

“How to Train Your Dragon,” Cole answered for them both, “ _Two_.”

“A fine choice,” she agreed.

She went into the chest in the side of the room and found the large blanket Robb told her that Sansa had knit for them.

“Who wants water?” she asked.

The boys both agreed so she went back in the kitchen and checked on the popcorn and found the sippy cups she liked Cole to use when he was sitting on the couch. She grabbed a large bowl and dumped the freshly made popcorn into it and then tossed some salt and a little butter on it. She popped a piece in her mouth and brought the bowl and cups into the living room.

“Alright, where am I sitting?” she asked them.

“Here,” Wes said, scooting slightly away from Cole.

Her son lifted the blanket and she got in between them, handing them each their cup and then settling the blanket around them. She placed the popcorn bowl on her lap and took the remote Wes offered her and found the movie for them.

Cole reached his hand in first and munched on a few pieces, “Thrifs isfjs gooderdf.”

Wes looked up at her and she laughed lightly, and he smiled in return before taking his own little handful. The movie began and they both settled against her, so she kicked off her shoes and put her feet up on the coffee table. She’d seen the movie so many times that she could recite the lines without prompting, but she was guilty of watching Audrey Hepburn movies over and over again when she needed bucking up so she understood the impulse.

Her phone buzzed next to her and she grabbed it from underneath the blanket. Though she knew it wouldn’t be she hoped it was Robb telling her that everything was alright. It was from Gilly though.

GC: _If I don’t have your soup container on Monday afternoon, give me a firm talking to._

MM: _Don’t worry about it! I know where you live, remember?_

She glanced at Wes who was watching the movie happily, his head against her arm. He didn’t notice her gaze and reached in and grabbed more popcorn, munching on it mindlessly.

GC: _What are you up to today?_

Myrcella’s stomach churned, unsure of what to do. On the one hand, she knew that Robb hadn’t wanted to bother Gilly, and on the other, Gilly was their family.

MM: _I’m actually at Robb’s. Brynden was brought to the hospital, I really have no details. He just left so I can keep you posted, but I wouldn’t reach out right now._

Gilly started typing immediately.

GC: _What? No! Is he going to be okay?_

GC: _sorry you just said you didn’t know. Will you keep me posted? How’s wes? How’s robb? Why didn’t he call me???_

Myrcella started typing and then stopped and then started typing again and then stopped.

MM: _I promise I will let you know whatever I know. Wes is okay. He’s a little upset but he’s okay._

GC: _Robb?_

MM: _He’s a titan. A terrified one, but a titan, nonetheless._

GC: _Sounds about right. Can I do anything?_

MM: _Not right now, I might be bothering you later on where to find things once I try to tackle dinner but we’re just watching a movie. Please don’t reach out to Robb. He didn’t want to bother you with this._

GC: _I’m going to kill that boy DEAD. Hope you got your last looks!_

GC: _I now realize that was incredibly inappropriate given the circumstances. I just wish I could do something._

Myrcella knew as much as anyone else, better than most actually, that when it came to medical crises a lot of the time was actually pretty boring. It wasn’t a relaxing sort of boredom, but a restless one. Even still there was little to do but wait.

MM: _Distract me and tell me who your boyfriend is._

GC: _Ella!_

MM: _Oh you’re with him right now, aren’t you?_

GC: _I’m not answering that. Shouldn’t you be watching Wes at the moment?_

Myrcella held her phone up and snapped a picture of Wes’ head resting against her arm.

GC: _Now I REALLY want to come over. My little button._

MM: _I don’t want to freak him out…_

GC: _That’s fair. Okay. Fine. But I want hourly updates!_

MM: _And I want a name!_

GC: _Text me back in ONE hour._

GC: _But only about the following men: Brynden Tully, Robb Stark, or Wes Stark. No other information will be given or received._

Myrcella smiled and tucked her phone back next to her. She ate a couple of pieces of popcorn and leaned further back against the couch. Wes burrowed against her and she lifted her arm so that he could lean against her chest. Cole, not upset but a perpetual snuggle bug, lifted her other arm and leaned against her too.

Wes agreed to fast forwarding through the part that always made Cole cry and when the movie ended the pair of them looked at her.

“Did Daddy call?” Wes asked her.

She glanced at her phone and saw that she’d received nothing from Robb.

“Not yet, sweetheart,” she said, “But these things can take a little time. We just have to be patient, but I know it’s kind of hard, huh?”

Wes nodded glumly and she stroked his cheek. She wished there was something she could do to make him feel better.

She texted Gilly: _No news. What’s Wes’ comfort food?_

Her stomach knotted when Gilly started typing back immediately, she had clearly been waiting eagerly for more information.

GC: _Breakfast for dinner. There should be bacon in the freezer, and the waffle machine is in the pantry next to the crockpot. He likes pancakes but prefers waffles._

MM: _Because he has exquisite taste. Thanks babe._

“So…,” Myrcella noted, “I’m getting a _little_ hungry. Anyone else?” The boys nodded so she said, “Hmm you know what I could _really_ go for?”

“What?” Wes asked.

“Waffles,” she declared.

His eyes lit up, “I love waffles!”

“Me too,” she grinned.

“Me three!” Cole agreed.

She shrugged, “Well it’s clear the three of us were meant to be, now isn’t it?” The boys nodded in agreement, “Alright why don’t you two do some reading or playing, you could take Grey Wind outside and play fetch if you wanted? And I’ll get some waffles together.”

“Let’s play with Grey Wind!” Cole suggested.

“Yeah!” Wes agreed, “Come on, boy.”

Grey Wind shot off the floor and started begging for all of their affection. The boys gave it to him readily and they slowly made their way off the couch.

“Are there any boys here who would eat bacon?” she asked.

“MEEEEE,” they said in unison.

Not wanting to draw attention to Wes’ change in mood she simply nodded and told them to stay in the part of the yard where she could see them. They ran outside with Grey Wind and she went into the kitchen and located the waffle maker and a pan for bacon.

She pulled out all of the ingredients and settled into the business of making everything. When the batter was made she let it sit and thicken up and pulled out fruit. There was already a plate cut up in the fridge so she added some pomegranates (Wes’ favorite) and blackberries (Cole’s favorite) and set it on the table.

She glanced outside and smiled, taking in the sight of her son and Robb’s playing with his dog. Grey Wind could get a bit raucous with Robb. She’d seen the pair of them full out wrestle. He was very calm with Wes though and Cole too. Her as well for that matter. The boys were taking turns throwing the ball for him using the chucker Robb had but never used.

Myrcella glanced at her phone and saw that she had a text from Robb. Her heart leapt and she opened it immediately.

RS: _Brynden is stable but they are going to be running a LOT of tests. It’s going to go pretty late, and they haven’t ruled out surgery. I should know that around 8 though. All okay there?_

MM: _I’m so glad to hear he is stable. Stay as long as you need. Wes is a trooper! He’s outside right now playing with Cole and Grey Wind. I’ve got him, I promise._

Robb started typing back immediately.

RS: _That is the one thing I’m not worried about._

Her whole body warmed at that and she couldn’t help but think about that kiss before he left. It was wrong to be thinking about it in that way. It was a kiss of gratitude, not romance. Her body had been so long without contact though that it had been set on fire by the simple press of his lips to her cheek. And his hands on her arms. And his smell.

_Stop it_.

MM: _Don’t be mad but I told Gilly. She texted me and asked what I was doing and I didn’t want to lie._

RS: _Thank the gods, she’d murder me if she didn’t find out until Monday. She pissed?_

MM: _Concerned… and a little pissed. Like 95/5._

MM: _Okay 80/20._

MM: _OKAY 70/30 but definitely NOT more than 50/50._

RS: _Please don’t make me laugh. Laughing in an ER is frowned upon._

MM: _I’ll leave you alone._

RS: _No don’t! I mean if you’re busy that’s okay. I just… have nothing to do but wait here._

MM: _I am not busy, just waiting for the waffle iron to heat up._

RS: _Breakfast for dinner? Pardon my drool._

She laughed and typed back: _I’ll leave the leftover batter in the fridge. You can have some when you get home. And the bacon too, though with Cole around no promises of any left standing._

RS: _A man after my own heart._

RS: _Did I ruin your plans?_

MM: _Not a one. Besides – you get to._

RS: _Take whatever book you want out of the library and let me know if you need help with the tv. Oh and I know you never bring sufficient clothing for yourself so grab a sweatshirt if you need it._

MM: _Hey Robb?_

RS: _Yeah Ella?_

MM: _I can take care of me too._

RS: _I know, I just want you to be comfortable there._

She held up her phone and posed near the batter, holding the spatula.

MM: _Settling in just fine._

Robb started typing and then stopped again. The typing bubbles appeared and disappeared. For a moment she was afraid that it had been a weird thing to do. But then he finally responded.

RS: _He looked so frail._

MM: _Can I give you some advice?_

RS: _Please._

MM: _Try to talk to him like you would normally. Don’t tiptoe around him. If you usually tease him, tease him. He’ll make it clear if he needs to be coddled._

RS: _He hates to be coddled._

MM: _That is hugely unsurprising._

RS: _How’s the waffle iron?_

She hadn’t thought about it but it must be ready so she poured in the first batch. She turned on the stove and placed the bacon in the pan.

MM: _Piping hot. How are you doing? Honestly?_

RS: _Better._

RS: _Dr. Selmy says that’s all we can ask for._

MM: _I think he might be right._

RS: _The doctor wants to talk to me. I’ll text you later._

Myrcella placed her phone down and got the rest of dinner ready. When she’d poured the boys milk she called them back inside. They had color in their cheeks and smiles on their faces and when she asked them to go wash up they ran down the hall together as they usually would.

When Wes returned she turned to him, “Sweetheart do you know where Grey Wind’s food is?”

“Yeah,” he nodded, “I can feed him. Come on boyyyy.”

Grey Wind followed dutifully, sniffing Wes’ cheek and then poking his head in the collar of his shirt as though he might be keeping his dinner in there. She looked at Cole and gave him a thumbs up with a raised brow and he nodded affirmatively, giving her one back.

They all settled in and ate dinner. As suspected, there was no bacon left behind but she hadn’t used a fair amount of the batter and put that in the fridge along with the leftover fruit. She suggested making Brynden some _get well soon_ cards because the fact that Robb had said he was stable and could think enough to text with her told her that he was going to be fine, even if he had a recovery period in front of him.

Though Cole had never met him, he decorated his with fish just like Wes decorated his. She drew a picture of the Tully’s old family home with the mote in front of it and signed hers from Grey Wind.

When they were finished she took them upstairs and read them two books and got them into their pajamas. They were already so snug in Wes’ bed, with Grey Wind in between their feet, so she pulled the covers over both of them and kissed Cole’s head and then Wes’.

“Ella?” Wes asked.

“Yeah sweetheart?” she stroked his head.

“Will Daddy be home soon?” he wondered.

“I think he’s going to be a little while longer,” she told him, “But you have Cole and Grey Wind right here.”

“And you’re staying?” Wes asked.

“Yeah sweetheart,” she promised, stroking his hair, “I’ll be just downstairs if you need anything.”

He lifted off the bed and wrapped his arms around her neck. She perched on the bed so that she could take him more fully in her arms, holding his little body to her. She pressed kisses to his hair, overwhelmed with love for this sweet little boy.

“Can you try to sleep, and dream good dreams?” she asked.

He nodded against her and she helped him settle back down. She plopped a kiss on Cole’s forehead, though he was already asleep and then Wes’, and then Grey Wind’s and then got off the bed and went to the door to shut out the light.

She left the door open and padded down the hallway, only a little surprised when Grey Wind fell into step beside her. Robb had mentioned that he slept with Wes, but with Robb not here it made sense that Grey Wind would want to stay alert.

“Keeping an eye on things?” she asked.

He leaned his head against her leg and she pet his fur. She brought him downstairs and let him out once again, locking the door when he returned.

She made sure everything was fully cleaned up from dinner and that everything was definitely off and put away and then she went into the living room and got on the couch. Robb hadn’t texted while she was upstairs, but it was just now 8:01 so it would likely be a little while before she heard from him.

Myrcella turned on the tv and tucked her legs up under her. She changed the channel to the old movie one that she loved and smiled when she saw that _An Affair to Remember_ was on. Grey Wind hopped up onto the couch next to her, all but smiling at her.

“Are you allowed to be up here?” she asked him, scratching underneath his chin.

He let out a grunt and then laid down with his head in her lap, which suggested to her at least that it was allowed. She leaned back against the couch and pet him as she watched the movie on and off, checking her phone every so often.

It was very comfortable here, with Grey Wind’s reassuring, contented breaths and Cary Grant in the background.

***

Grey Wind greeted him at the front door and he pet him a bit before letting him outside and going in to check on everyone. The fact that Ella didn’t also come to the door suggested that she was sleeping so he walked up the stairs to Wes’ room to see him first.

The door was open the way he liked and rather than Grey Wind curled up next to him, Cole was. The bed was more than big enough for the two of them, but the little boys had huddled together. Wes had predictably kicked all of the covers off of him while Cole had wrapped his portion around him like a burrito.

He walked over as quietly as he could and knelt down, brushing Wes’ hair back. He didn’t want to wake him, but he couldn’t help but take in the freckles on his nose and the long lashes and the way his face looked happy in sleep. He kissed his forehead gently and then checked on Cole. He smirked when he saw his look of grim determination, as though a dream wasn’t going quite his way, and smoothed his hair before heading back into the hallway.

The other bedrooms were empty and he realized then that he hadn’t told Ella to use one of them. He went back downstairs and let Grey Wind back in and then bypassed the kitchen for the living room.

There was only one of the table lamps on, and some old movie was on in the background, and she was there, curled up on his couch.

He almost didn’t want to wake her, but he knew she’d be more comfortable if she didn’t sleep like that.

Robb went over and was unsure how best to wake her, and he took a moment to just look at her. Some of her golden hair had fallen in her face and her bottom lip protruded in a pout but her forehead was smooth.

And she looked too right curled up here.

“El,” he said as gently as he was able, nudging her arm.

She shifted slightly, her brow furrowing and then her eyelashes started moving and revealed her jade eyes slowly. As her eyes opened her smile widened.

“ _Robb_ ,” she said, her voice still thick from sleep.

That voice sent a thousand different currents through his body.

“Hey there,” he tried for a casual tone.

She stretched and then looked around, confusion dawning on her and then looked up, “I fell asleep?”

“It’s late,” he assured her.

She sat up then, smoothing her hair and looking around, blinking at him.

“How’s Brynden?” she asked.

He sat down on the couch next to her and nodded, “He’s going to be okay. He’s going to be _miserable_ because the doctor has told him to cut back on red meat and whiskey but he’s going to be okay.”

“Thank the gods,” she exulted. She looked at him then, “And how are you?”

“Better,” he nodded, his eyes crinkling when she smiled at the now familiar word.

“I put Cole down with Wes,” she told him, with a face that suggested she thought he might not be happy about it. “I hope that’s alright?”

He nodded, “Of course it is. They’re both fast asleep.” He then realized he was admitting to going upstairs before relieving her and said, “I wanted to check on him.”

Her small hand rubbed his upper arm, a contented smile giving way to a yawn, “Of course you did.”

“I don’t think you should drive home right now,” he told her.

She shook her head, “No point really. What time are you going back in the morning?”

The question was asked so casually, as though they’d already had an agreement. As though there was no question as to whether she would be staying with his son, or whether he’d want to be there. Like he didn’t even have to ask.

He wondered if she knew it was rare, her generosity, but she doubted she did, for how unceremoniously she gave it.

“I can ask Theon to come take Wes for the day,” he told her. “If you have things.”

“Oh! Of course, if Wes would be more com-“

“No!” he cut in, shaking his head, “It’s not that. I just… don’t want you to feel like you have to.”

“I don’t feel like that,” she told him. He looked down at his lap and then to his immense surprise her fingertips touched his cheek. Featherlight, they shouldn’t have burned him but they did nonetheless and the sheer feel of them forced his eyes back to hers. Her voice had taken that thickness back on when she repeated, “I don’t.”

He wanted Brynden back on his feet. He wanted his bed, or maybe some waffles. He wanted a hundred thousand different things. But if he were being honest with himself, in that _exact_ moment, a moment of unadulterated selfishness, there was nothing in the world he wanted more than to kiss the woman in front of him.

He took her small wrist in his hand and pressed a kiss to her knuckle. Her eyes widened and her lips parted, and it became even harder to resist what he wanted when it seemed like she wanted it to.

“Let’s get you to bed,” he suggested, needing to create some distance. Her expression took on one of surprise and he realized that it sounded like the very opposite of creating distance so he amended, “To a guest bedroom.”

He watched as understanding and then embarrassment took hold on her face and she nodded mutely. Her wrist was still in his hand, so he moved it down and took hold of her hand and pulled her up.

“There’s batter in the fridge,” she told him. “And we made cards for Brynden if you want to take them with you in the morning.”

She’d unsurprisingly taken care of everything and he wanted to take care of her too, though it was difficult with a woman like her who so rarely needed anything.

He brought her to one of the guest rooms that had an en suite bathroom.

“Let me get you something to sleep in,” he suggested.

“Oh you don’t -,” she started and then looked at him. He wondered if she saw his desire all over his face to do this one, tiny thing, or whether she just didn’t want to sleep in her jeans. Either way she nodded once, “Thanks.”

He went into his bedroom and grabbed her a pair of flannel pajama pants and a soft t shirt, both of which would drown her. When he went back down the hall he saw her coming back upstairs with her bag.

“Do you need a toothbrush, toothpaste or anything?” he asked.

She shook her head and patted her bag, “Check, check.”

He smirked and handed her the clothes and she thanked him. They stood there looking at one another.

He was about to step closer, but then she yawned. Her eyes lit in embarrassment as she was covering her mouth. It didn’t help though because just as she’d been seemingly about to step forward, he yawned. He couldn’t help but laugh and they parted with _goodnights_ and _sleep tights_ and _thank yous_.

When he got into his room all he wanted was to fall into bed, but he changed into pajamas and brushed his teeth and washed his face.

He would have expected it to be difficult, laying there in bed, knowing she was down the hall, wearing his clothes, laying in one of her own. The truth was though, he was asleep before his head hit the pillow.

*

Wes woke him as usual on Sunday mornings and he did his best to keep them quiet as he set about making coffee and feeding Grey Wind and all the rest.

His son had a lot of questions about Uncle Brynden, and Robb kept assuring him, so thankful that he could without reservation, that he was going to be just fine.

There would be a battle in the days to come. As Robb was adamant that his uncle was going to come stay with them. He hadn’t broached it with him last night, Brynden had been too wiped out, but he knew it would be a fight when he did. His first order of business, after making sure his uncle had everything he needed, would be to discuss it with the doctors to see if they could be a united front.

Wes told him all about what he’d done with Cole and Ella. The truth was, Robb had realized as he sat in the waiting room with nothing to do but fixate, he hadn’t even thought about who to call. Rationally, it should have been Gilly. Other than him, she was his caregiver. If he hadn’t wanted to bother her though it should have been Theon. Theon who would have cancelled any plans with any girl if he or his son needed him. Yet he hadn’t even considered him, he’d just dialed her number. As he listened to Wes though, he knew that if it had been a decision it would have been the right one.

Gilly would have kept him comfortable, but she was so gentle and caring that he wasn’t sure she would have been able to distract him from his concerns, only hold him through them. Theon, on the other hand, would have been all distraction.

Ella – and Cole – though had found a way to do both. Which was why he didn’t bother to hide the plan for the day from his son.

“So honey, I’m going to go back to the hospital this morning, alright?” he said, “And you’re going to stay with Ella and Cole again. I’ll be home this afternoon though.”

Wes nodded, sipping his juice, “Okay Daddy.”

“What do you think you’ll do with them?” he asked.

Before Wes could answer, Ella came into the kitchen, Grey Wind getting up to greet her.

“Good morning!” she offered brightly.

Everything he knew about her had told him that when she came downstairs she would be dressed in her clothes from the day before. So he really hadn’t stopped to prepare himself for the sight of her in his old Direwolves t shirt or the way the bottoms of pajama pants would pool at her feet.

“Hi Ella!” Wes greeted her, giving him a moment to recover as she plopped a kiss on his son’s head.

The pair of them were talking about how well they’d slept so he went into the cupboard and grabbed her a mug for coffee.

“It’s not vanilla,” he warned her.

She grinned, “Does it have caffeine in it?”

“Yeah,” he grinned back.

“Then get out of my way, Stark,” she teased and he handed her the mug and stepped back with his hands raised, earning her gorgeous giggle.

He grabbed her the milk and the sugar and she doctored her coffee to her specifications before propping herself up on her elbows against the counter.

“Should we expect a Cole sighting?” he asked.

“Not for another hour at least,” she smiled. Then looked at him, “So you’ll miss him.”

Her tone brooked no discussion and he was grateful for it. He was eager to get back to the hospital, he’d been assured that he’d see progress after Brynden had slept and he wanted to erase the mental image of his titan of an uncle looking so withered and spent.

“I’m going to go hop in the shower and then get out of here,” he agreed, “Do you need anything?”

“Just a minute,” she told him, then grinned, “I’ll walk you out.”

He chuckled and nodded, promising to say goodbye to Wes before he left. She followed him towards the stairs, and he turned around.

“So,” she started, “This is _totally_ up to you but… Wes kept asking me if he could see Brynden. I didn’t want to say anything because I wasn’t sure what the situation was but… I think not seeing him is just leaving him to wonder.”

Robb nodded, because Wes had asked him the same.

“I think…,” he started, “Why don’t I go there and see how he’s doing, and let you know? Wes’ll make him feel better, but it was bad enough for him to have _me_ see him like that let alone Wes…”

She nodded, “I totally understand. I just wanted to bring it up.”

“I appreciate it,” he told her genuinely, “And if he’s doing well enough, I can come back and grab him.”

“Or we’ll bring him,” she suggested. “You’ll probably want to be there longer than he will so-,” she broke off and looked at him, “Sorry am I totally overstepping?”

“What?” he asked in horror, “No…”

“Sorry you’re just…,” her eyes trailed over his face, “Looking at me like…”

“Like…,” he prompted, because he had no idea how he was looking at her, only that he couldn’t seem to stop.

She smiled, shaking her head, “I don’t know. So anyway, just think about it. I won’t make any promises.”

He thanked her for the thousandth time and she waved him off for the just as many and then he went up the stairs. He showered quickly and dressed and when he went downstairs Cole still wasn’t down so he said goodbye to Wes and Ella.

He made a big show of taking the cards they’d made for Brynden and then drove over to his uncle’s house and grabbed him a few things before going back to the hospital.

When he arrived, things had taken a turn for the worse.

In the sense that his uncle was feeling better enough to be an absolute nightmare. He thought the doctors were phonies and the nurses were simpering fools and when Uncle Edmure dropped by with flowers they almost got shoved into an unmentionable place.

He texted Ella that Wes could come by anytime and then warned his uncle that if he was anything other than sunshine and rainbows with his son that he would tell the doctor he’d noticed some irregularities and ask for another round of tests.

That earned him a glare but nothing more and he calmed down enough to eat some of his breakfast and answer questions without barking.

“Mr. Stark,” an orderly came in, “There’s a woman and two children here…”

Robb looked at his uncle who pushed himself up in bed and nodded at him. A nurse had changed him into pajamas so with the renewed color in his face he looked like he was just having a bit of a lazy morning.

“They can come in, thank you,” he agreed.

Wes came in first, bounding in and then stopping when he saw Uncle Brynden in bed. Robb went and took his hand but Uncle Brynden wasn’t having any of it.

“What are you doing over there?” Uncle Brynden asked, “I go to the hospital and I don’t even get a _hug_?”

Wes grinned and released his hand and crawled up onto the bed and into Brynden’s arms. His uncle held him tightly, rubbing his back, the pair of them talking a mile a minute the way they always did.

He saw Cole waiting in the part of the room where he couldn’t be seen by Brynden. Robb couldn’t help but smile at him, who was always so exuberant, being so thoughtful and gentle now.

“Hey buddy,” he greeted him and then looked at Ella. Who was standing in the doorway, her face as white as a sheet, the light hitting her in such a way that she almost looked translucent. “Why uh…why don’t you come in here and keep a watch on Brynden with Wes for me, okay?”

Cole nodded and came in and he glanced at his Uncle Brynden. The fear must have been clear on his face because his uncle nodded to him and turned more kindly to Cole than he had to anyone else.

Robb stepped forward into the hall and didn’t think he just took Ella’s cheeks in his hands. She was shaking and her eyes couldn’t seem to focus on him.

“Come on,” he said as gently as he was able, his hands moving down to her shoulder and back so that he could turn her around, “Let’s get you outside, you’re okay.”

She didn’t say anything but she let him guide her towards the door. As they were heading there a doctor stopped them.

“Myrcella!” he greeted her in surprise, “It’s been so-“

The doctor stopped talking as he took in her face and in that moment, Robb knew exactly how long it had been since the man had last seen her. A little over five years, though he’d likely seen her every day for months before that.

“Excuse us,” Robb said not altogether kindly.

The doctor seemed to understand and stepped out of his way and Robb took Ella outside into the fresh air. She took deep, greedy gulps of air but it didn’t seem to do anything to stop the panic attack she was having.

“You’re okay,” he promised, “You’re okay.”

She wasn’t though, that much was perfectly clear. He didn’t know what to do for her, so he did the only thing he could think of and wrapped his arms around her and held her tightly to his chest.

“You’re okay,” he promised again, “You’re okay.”

He could feel her heartbeat against him, as rapid as a hummingbird’s and he rubbed her back and stroked her hair, taking deep breaths of his own. He hoped his heart rate would steady and hers would mimic it.

After a moment he felt her arms wrap around his back, holding onto his shirt and then she let out a cry against his chest.

“That’s it,” he agreed, “That’s it, I’ve got you.”

She sunk against his chest and he held her more tightly, rubbing her back. He could feel her heartbeat slow under his hand and he kept repeating the gesture.

“I’m sorry,” she whispered against him.

“Don’t be sorry,” he chided.

She took a deep breath and squeezed him tighter and they stood like that for a minute or two until her breath quieted.

He didn’t release her until he felt her arms loosen their grip on him and even then, he held onto her arms so that he could be sure she’d stay upright.

Tears had pooled in her eyes and she shook her head, “I haven’t been back here since.”

“Yeah,” he nodded.

“I thought I could handle it,” she confessed, “I thought I was doing better.”

“This doesn’t mean you aren’t,” he promised, “This place is… haunted for you.”

She nodded and looked up at him, opening her mouth to say something and then thinking better of it and pressing her face against his chest again. He held her to him, kissing her hair.

“I’m supposed to be helping you,” she noted drily.

He smiled sadly, “Yeah well, maybe we’re just going to have to let ourselves help each other.”

“I can’t go back in there,” she confessed.

“That’s alright,” he promised. “Leave the boys with us.”

“No,” she shook her head, “You don’t need Cole in your hair.”

She let go of him and so he let go of her too.

“Cole is never in my hair,” he reminded her.

She shook her head, “No Wes should have some time with you both. Why don’t you send Cole out to me and we’ll-“

“I don’t want you driving,” he interrupted her.

He usually wouldn’t be so forceful, particularly not when she was so upset, but the oddest chill had ran down his spine. It felt like a premonition.

She looked up at him, as though she knew he was haunted too and nodded, “I won’t. There’s… tons of places to walk around here, send Cole out and we’ll give you all some time and then pick up lunch for you and Wes and Brynden if he’s allowed and then you can either keep Wes here with you or we’ll take him.” He opened his mouth to argue but she looked up at him, “I would never drive either of our sons if I didn’t feel okay. Okay?”

“Will you extend that to yourself?” he asked her.

“Okay,” she nodded.

He asked, “Should I go get Cole?”

“Okay,” she agreed.

There was something in her eyes though, so he suggested, “Why don’t we stay out here for another minute?”

He caught the briefest moment of a heartbreaking, grateful smile before she stepped back into his arms, and he knew that this time, it was her heart steadying his.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> ya'll still with me? I know that posting every day is A LOT especially when they are ch of this size so I may slow down a bit bc honestly I'm a slut for comments (we know this) and I don't want to overload people


	13. Chapter 13

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> How is it only Tuesday??? It's been a busy week so far but I got sudden insp for this chapter so I wanted to write it before my week got even crazier! It's shorter (and lighter) than the last one. I hope you enjoy!

Myrcella smoothed her white button down as she said hello to the receptionist.

“Myrcella!” her therapist greeted her in the doorway to her office.

“Dr. Dayne,” she smiled, “It’s nice to see you.”

“And you,” Dayne agreed and gestured her inside, “Come in.”

She stepped inside and sat down in her usual seat, pulling her water bottle from her bag and taking a small sip, and making sure that her phone was set only to alert her if Cole’s school was calling.

“So, how are you?” Dr. Dayne asked.

“I’m fine thank you, how are you?” Myrcella answered.

“Fine thank you,” Dayne agreed. “What would you like to talk about today?”

She’d noticed the difference in how Dayne began their sessions last week. Last week had been the first since they’d discussed Myrcella wanting to be happy and apparently that had marked a turning point where she could be in charge of the pace of their sessions.

Myrcella felt worthy of that trust when she admitted, “There was a bit of an incident over the weekend.”

“An incident,” Dr. Dayne repeated.

She nodded, taking a sip of her water and then placing it down beside her, “I haven’t been to the hospital where Trystane was treated and ultimately died, since giving birth to Cole.” Dr. Dayne’s face was impassive so she went on, “This weekend I was there and I think I had some sort of … a panic attack, maybe? I looked up the symptoms after and it certainly _feels_ like that’s what it could have been, but I know that looking up your symptoms on the internet is a recipe for disaster.”

Dayne smiled at that and said, “First of all, is everyone alright?”

Myrcella nodded, “Yes, thank the gods. Robb’s Uncle, his _great uncle_ actually, was taking to the hospital after collapsing. He’ll be alright, he was released from the hospital on Monday.”

“That must have been very scary for him, Robb, I mean,” Dayne said, “And you? Are you close with his uncle?”

She shook her head, “I only know him peripherally.”

“Yet you were at the hospital?” Dayne asked.

“Oh,” Myrcella nodded, “I was watching Wes, while Robb was at the hospital. Wes looks at his great _great_ uncle as a grandfather and was very upset and wanted to see him, so I brought him there once we knew he was up to it.”

“That was very brave of you,” Dr. Dayne noted.

Myrcella shook her head, “Foolish.” Her therapist’s eyebrow raised and Myrcella admitted, “I had tricked myself into thinking it would be okay. It’s been over _five_ years.”

“Exactly,” Dayne agreed, “Myrcella it had been over _five_ years and you returned, with little thought for yourself it seems, to the site of a place of _great_ trauma. I think the very fact that it has been over five years is exactly _why_ it was so difficult. Likely, in your mind, that place has loomed heavily. I’ll bet you do what you can not to drive by it?” Myrcella looked at her for a moment and then nodded. Dr. Dayne nodded in return and said, “It’s a place that may _always_ be haunted for you.” Myrcella couldn’t help but smile at that and her therapist asked, “What did I say?”

“Haunted,” Myrcella shook her head, realizing how silly it was. She shrugged, “It’s what Robb said. I keep telling him he ought to change professions and become a therapist.” She then realized how horribly insulting that statement might be to someone with extensive schooling and sixteen years of experience, “Not that I’m in _any_ way trying to downplay the difficulty of your job.”

Dr. Dayne now smiled, “Relax. A lot of this job is just paying attention. So, it would seem, Robb would be quite good at it… when it comes to you anyway.”

“Dr. Dayne!” Myrcella scolded, her hands flying to her cheeks to cover her blush.

Her therapist shrugged as though she couldn’t help herself and then turned more serious, “I would like to talk about that though. Robb… you two talked about it?”

Myrcella took another sip of water and confessed, “He actually was the one who noticed. I was standing in the doorway to Brynden’s – his uncle’s – room and watching the boys go inside and I just… couldn’t move. Robb must have noticed and suddenly I was outside. I don’t… I don’t really remember getting there? I just... I was standing in the hospital and then I was outside, in the heavy, wet, cool air and his arms were around me. I could feel his heartbeat.” She could still hear it. _Thud…thud…thud._ “And it was like mine…”

“Mimicked it?” Dr. Dayne guessed. Myrcella nodded. “He was smart to think of that.”

“Think of what?” Myrcella asked.

“Hugging someone can help temper a panic attack,” she explained, “And _mirroring_ is another technique.”

“Oh,” Myrcella nodded, feeling a lump in her stomach. “Why am I frustrated by that?”

“Why do you think?” Dr. Dayne asked.

Myrcella wanted to tell her she was better than that, but she thought about it instead. All but coming to in Robb’s arms had been like waking out of a terrible dream, safe underneath her puffy comforter. His body was solid granite and yet his grip was so gentle, and it felt so nice to be held.

No. That wasn’t entirely true.

It hadn’t felt so nice to be held. It had felt so nice to be held by _him_.

“I suppose… that I wish it hadn’t been a technique,” she admitted.

“You were watching Wes?” Dr. Dayne asked her after a moment.

Myrcella was confused by the change in subject but was grateful for it anyway so she answered, “Yes. Robb called on Saturday afternoon, so Cole and I went over.”

“That was kind of you,” Dr. Dayne noted.

Myrcella shook her head, “No, I love Wes. I was glad that Robb called. Well, not _glad_ that he had a reason to call, but glad that he called me.”

“But if another parent from Cole’s class had called,” Dr. Dayne noted, “You would have gone and helped, wouldn’t you?”

“Of course,” Myrcella agreed.

“Why of course?” Dr. Dayne asked.

“Because,” Myrcella’s brow furrowed, “If someone needs help, you help them.”

“But with Robb it was beyond that, wasn’t it?” Dr. Dayne asked.

“Well of course it was,” Myrcella noted. “Wes and he… are important to us. It’s different… I guess… because I would have helped whoever called… but with Robb it felt… right? That he called I mean. I wanted to be there, for him, for them, whatever they needed.”

Dr. Dayne nodded, “So… even though it’s the sort of thing you’d do to help _anyone_. It doesn’t mean there wasn’t something more in it.” Myrcella felt herself getting frustrated but Dayne put her out of her misery, “Sort of like Robb hugging you?”

For some reason Myrcella felt a smile on her face and then a laugh escaped her lips, “Wow. You really took me on a journey for that one, huh?”

Dr. Dayne shrugged, “Have to fill the time somehow.”

Myrcella laughed again, and then admitted, “He’s really handsome. I’m sorry, I know you’re not a girlfriend I just don’t know who else to say that to.”

Dr. Dayne smiled, “You can say that to me.” Her therapist looked at her and asked, “Are you feeling… more open to the idea of the two of you?”

She found herself nodding before she even registered her answer. Apparently, it was a _yes_ though.

“It’s sort of like what we were talking about a couple of weeks ago, with him making things easier?” she said. “When I’m around him I feel ready. Dr. Dayne… I…”

“Go on,” Dr. Dayne prompted.

She shook her head, her fingers on her lips, “When I’m around him sometimes I feel… it feels so right. And it’s only later, or sometimes something happens like I catch sight of a picture of Trystane and I’m hit with this guilt. Or I suppose just a reminder that I’m not ready.”

“I think those two things should be treated separately,” Dr. Dayne noted, “There is your guilt. And there is whether you are ready or not. The one does not inform the other. Just because you feel guilt doesn’t mean you’re not ready. It could mean that you loved your husband dearly and it feels like you’re betraying him _by_ being ready. I’m not saying that it absolutely means you’re ready in this instant, but I think, particularly with a personality such as yours, if you are waiting for a time that you can enter into something free of guilt… you will be alone for a very long time.”

“Oh,” Myrcella said.

That was something she had never considered. She looked at Dr. Dayne for signs that she was being played but found nothing there that suggested it.

She had always just imagined that her guilt was a sign of not being ready. Never once had she considered that the two might be separate entities.

“I’d like to think about that more,” she admitted.

“I hope you do,” Dr. Dayne agreed, and then said, “But we still have time left, and I don’t think this is what you actually wanted to talk about.”

Myrcella thought back to the start of her session, though it was rather difficult, and then realized, “No, no I wanted to talk about the hospital. I thankfully have had no cause to be there in the last five years with Cole,” she then looked around for wood to knock. Dr. Dayne did it for her and Myrcella couldn’t help but smile, “But I need to be able to be there. So, I know that this may not be your thing usually, but I was wondering if we could talk about… exposure therapy?”

Dr. Dayne looked at her for a long moment, “We can. If you’d like.”

“But you don’t want to?” Myrcella guessed.

“It’s not that,” Dr. Dayne noted, “I’d like to do whatever I can to help you actually and if you truly believe this is it then we’ll get started next week. I just want you to go into it with gentle expectations of yourself.”

“What do you mean?” Myrcella asked.

“I suppose what I mean is,” Dr. Dayne said, “I agree that getting you to a place where you do not have a panic attack anytime you are in that hospital is important. But the goal of a lot of exposure therapy is _indifference_ , and I don’t think you need to be indifferent to the place where you lost your husband. Is that what you want?”

“No,” Myrcella agreed, “I don’t think indifference is a place I ever want to be when it comes to this. I just want to know that if the time came, if something _happened_ , and I needed to, that I could go there for Cole, or for someone else.”

“Well,” Dr. Dayne smiled, “Then my job is done. Because Myrcella, when the time came – you did.”

*

A few hours later Myrcella was standing at the Starks kitchen counter, taking a very deep breath.

“Okay,” she said, “We can do this.”

“Okay,” a voice of grim determination answered.

“Boom,” Myrcella hit her chest, “Snap,” she snapped the fingers of the same hand, “Clap,” she hit her other hand, “Boom, boom, snap, clap, snap.”

She watched as Sophie’s brow furrowed and she repeated in her sweet, sing-song voice, “Boom, snap, clap?” Myrcella nodded, mouthing _boom, boom,_ “Boom, boom,” _snap,_ “Snap”, _clap,_ “ClapSNAP!”

“You did it!” Myrcella grinned, accepting the kiss the little girl placed on her cheek.

Gilly laughed next to them where she was chopping up a cucumber to put in the already overflowing salad bowl, “My older sister taught me that. I didn’t know people did it everywhere.”

“It’s _so_ cool,” Sophie determined.

The little girl had hypothetically come over to play with Wes and Cole, but had been in the kitchen for the last hour with her and Gilly. Though Myrcella knew the boys would have very quickly altered their playing to suit Sophie’s every whim, she had merely never left when they’d all come in to get a snack.

“HONEYYYYY I’M _HOME,_ ” they all heard from the door and then Grey Wind scrambled towards it and Wes and Cole followed behind, shouting for him.

“Thank the gods,” Brynden said as he came back into the kitchen and took a seat at the table, “Get those boys out of my hair.”

It was a little hard to believe that the man in front of her had suffered a minor heart attack only a few days earlier. Though he admittedly didn’t look ready to run a marathon, he was dressed in corduroys and a sweater and certainly had enough spirit.

Sophie giggled and Myrcella couldn’t help but smile. For all of his gruffness, he’d been playing with the kids for a lot of the afternoon.

“What rabbit food are you serving tonight, Nurse Pratchett?” Brynden asked Gilly.

“I _prefer_ ,” Gilly noted, “Miss Gilly.”

“Well, I _prefer_ ,” Brynden noted, “ _Steak_.”

Gilly was clearly about to give him a piece of her mind but glanced at Sophie who was not really listening and was practicing boom-snap-clap but was nevertheless in hearing distance.

The hospital had put Brynden on a strict diet and he was taking to it exactly as one might expect a man in his mid-seventies who had always done exactly what he pleased would. He’d been released on Monday and according to Robb and Gilly, been a terror ever since.

She didn’t find him to be, but she wasn’t the one who had locked up the whiskey.

Robb appeared a moment later with Cole and Wes climbing all over him. He grinned first at Sophie, who greeted him with her trademark _Hi Mr. Stark_ that always melted him and then he waved at the rest of them.

“Stay for dinner?” he asked, rather than saying hello.

Myrcella couldn’t help but smile. He was the fourth person to invite her and Cole for dinner at his house. Wes, Gilly and Brynden had all beat him to it.

Even still she answered, “We’d love to,” winking at Brynden when he smirked. Then she added, “Brynden has to teach me Spit.”

“Uncle Brynden’s gonna teach you how to _spit_?” Wes asked. “I can show you.”

“No,” she laughed, “It’s a card game. At least I think it is. Apparently, I’m going to get my butt womped.”

She expected to Robb to laugh but he was looking at Brynden. Actively she repressed the fear that she’d somehow overstayed their welcome. Robb had just invited her to dinner, her son and his were hanging off of him, he had told her that she was the only woman he’d want when he was ready.

It didn’t come naturally yet, but she was working hard to suppress the nagging feeling in the back of her mind that he was just being polite because she was a single mother. It was easier to when she focused on him rather than herself. Robb Stark was someone she could have faith in, even if Myrcella Martell wasn’t yet.

“Wes can you come help me mash the avocado?” Gilly asked.

Wes hurried to help and Sophie turned to see if she could help too, saying something about her nanny liked it with margaritas.

Robb glanced at her for that one and Myrcella gave him a stern look. There was no way Belinda was drinking on the job.

“Robb, I have to tell you a secret,” Cole announced.

This had started sometime after that first trip to the Science Museum. At morning drop off or when the four of them were hanging out, Cole would suddenly think of something that he had to tell Robb and Robb alone. Sometimes Robb realized that he too had a secret for Cole.

He grinned and crouched down, “Hit me.”

Cole whispered something in his ear that made his smile widen and then he turned and whispered something in Cole’s that made her son crack up.

Robb looked up at her and said, “Can you come with me for a minute?”

“Am I in trouble?” she asked.

“No,” he smirked, “Just need your help with something outside.”

Myrcella’s stomach flip-flopped about a thousand times but she nodded once and told Cole, who was now running to help mash the pulverized avocado, to be good for Gilly and Brynden.

She and Robb started walking down the hall.

“Hey,” he smiled. “Good day?”

“Really good,” she agreed. He glanced at her, “Dr. Dayne.”

“Good ol’ Dr. Dayne,” he grinned, “Seems like those sessions are getting more helpful.”

She shrugged, “You get out of it what you put into it, right?”

“Right,” he agreed, “I always feel terrible after I withhold from Selmy. And not just because he boxes my ears.”

Myrcella couldn’t help but laugh at that. It sounded like Robb and his therapist had a pretty different relationship than her and Dr. Dayne. Whatever it was though seemed to be working.

They got outside and Myrcella did her best not to shiver. They’d had a bit of a cold snap recently and the oversized sweater she’d thrown on over her button down was not enough against it.

“So what do you need help with?” she asked.

“Well actually,” Robb grinned, “It’s what you need help with.”

He went towards his car and opened the trunk and proffered a baseball and a baseball glove.

“You didn’t think I’d forgotten my promise, did you?” he asked her.

She smiled, because she _had_ almost forgotten, “Of course not. And that’s so sweet of you but…”

“But? Did you become a Major Leaguer without me?” he asked.

“No,” she shook her head, “It’s just cold out here.”

“Oh, yeah, sorry, go get your coat I’ll wait,” he nodded. She stayed silent and motionless, and Robb chided, “Myrcella.”

He was always on her about her lack of appropriate outerwear. He’d tried to gift her an umbrella but had agreed with her when she’d told him she’d just forget it anyway.

“I was just going from the car into the house,” she noted. He rolled his eyes and then shrugged out of his dark green Barbour coat and walked it over to her. “You don’t have to.”

“I’m aware of that,” he smirked, draping the coat over her shoulders. “Game face, Martell. No excuses.”

The coat was warm, not just because it had flannel lining and a waterproof outer layer, but because he’d been wearing it. She’d learned that he ran hot, and her body melted in the comforting feel of it.

Robb picked up a sleeve and rolled it and then the other. She couldn’t remember the last time someone had rolled her sleeves for her. He looked at her looking at him and blushed.

“Sorry,” he smiled sheepishly, “Habit.”

“I don’t mind,” she tried to tell him, but her voice was so soft she wasn’t sure he’d heard.

The softness of his eyes confirmed he had though and his hand was still against the underside of her wrist and she wondered if his heartbeat was mirroring the erratic beat of her own. He looked at her for a moment longer and suddenly they were standing much closer together and then just as quickly they were standing much further apart.

He held up the baseball and said, “Okay, so the trick to this is you’ve just got to trust yourself. If you overthink it, all is lost.”

***

“Well,” he confirmed, “You missed your calling.”

Myrcella grinned, feeling a little too happy about the fact that he was probably going to have a bruise on his palm from the last ball she’d thrown. He only had the one glove which he’d given to her, and he deserved the spot he’d have for underestimating her.

She was just so _little_ , it seemed a little unreasonably she’d be able to throw that hard.

His favorite thing about the Riverlands was that even when the days grew colder, they only grew a little shorter. Which was why at 6:15 in November it was still light enough that he could see the color that had been whipped into her cheeks and the brightness in her eyes.

“Thank you,” she told him in a tone far more sincere than was required for him throwing a baseball with her for twenty minutes, “Maybe I’ll teach him this weekend.”

He dramatically shook his hand, “Just get him a glove first.”

She rolled her eyes and nudged her shoulder against his arm, so he nudged her back. Her strength was surprising, but it didn’t stop her from careening sideways slightly so he grabbed her by the sleeve of his coat.

“Oh!” she exclaimed, turning towards him and stopping. He stopped as well and she looked up at him, her eyes scrunching as her eyebrows raised, “Before, um, was everything okay? With Brynden? Should he like… not being playing cards or something? Or does he need to rest?”

He wasn’t all that surprised that she’d caught the look of surprise on his face. Brynden hadn’t seemed to, or maybe he’d just been ignoring him.

“No, I mean yes he should rest,” he confirmed, “But considering we’ll be done with dinner by 7:15 he can take it,” she smiled at that but still looked up at him like she wanted to know. “It’s just that game. Spit. He used to play it with my Mom a lot. Sometimes when Sansa comes down they get into these days long tournaments, where they just leave the cards out in their exact positions until they can return to them. He… just never plays with anyone else so I was…surprised.”

“But not angry?” she asked hopefully.

He couldn’t help but smile at her, “No, not angry.”

With that confirmation in hand, her smile turned rueful, “Jealous? You want Brynden to whomp your butt?”

The mischievous glint in her eye beckoned his own and he said, “No, but I’m going to take pleasure in whomping yours if you don’t watch it.”

Her eyes went wide and his mouth dropped open, realizing just exactly how dirty that sounded. She covered her mouth and he was about to apologize when something suspiciously resembling a snort emanated from her.

“Ella…” he grinned.

That only made her laugh harder and his laugh joined her own.

“Let’s move past it?” he brushed the air when it had subsided.

She looked up at him, those pale jade eyes wandering over his face and nodded slowly, “We’re past it.”

His eyes stayed locked on hers for a moment and then suddenly they were standing closer together and then just as quickly they were standing even further apart.

She gave him one last look and then walked towards the house. He fell into step just behind her until they got to the door and he opened it for her. It was a habit, or it had been, but now he always made sure to do it for her because she always looked back at him, a slow smile spreading on her face. Sometimes, like now, she’d raised her hand and tuck a lock of hair behind her ear before thanking him quietly and walking through whatever door he’d opened.

As soon as they got back inside and washed their hands, chaos descended. Sophie felt _very_ strongly that Ella should sit next to her and Wes wanted to be next to Gilly _and_ Sophie _and_ Ella, which was mathematically impossible unless he sat _on_ the table but he had to appreciate his son’s commitment to the women in his life, but Cole also wanted to be next to Sophie _and_ him and Brynden was grumbling that no one seemed to want to sit next to him.

In the end it didn’t actually matter where everyone sat. He found himself in between Cole and Sophie, with Ella on the little girl’s other side and Gilly on the other side of Cole’s. Wes had taken one for the team and happily landed next to Brynden, and giggled the whole way through dinner as Brynden kept putting vegetables from his plate onto Wes’.

Sophie’s Mom came to pick her up and though he didn’t know her well, Ella seemed to and so she agreed to sit down for a few minutes. He wondered briefly if Ella was just being Ella or if she was actually being nicer to Mrs. Grey because she fully intended on being in-laws with her one day. He decided that it was a bit of both.

Sophie and her Mom left and then Brynden declared that the time had come.

“Let me just help them clean up first,” Ella suggested.

“Oh no, no, no, no,” Brynden shook his head, “You’re not delaying the inevitable.” 

“Please destroy him,” Gilly groaned.

Ella laughed and with a quick _pray for me_ she followed Brynden into the other room. Wes and Cole decided to make use of their extra time by going up to Wes’ room, so that left him and Gilly with clean up duty.

“You don’t have to help,” he reminded her as they cleared the table.

She shrugged, “I forgot what it’s like in here when it’s quiet. It’s kind of nice.”

He chuckled, “How was he today?”

“Which one?” Gilly asked.

“Both,” he confirmed as he went to the sink to start with the dishes.

“Wes was an angel,” Gilly noted, “Brynden on the other hand…”

“I know,” Robb agreed, “Most of it is in jest but I’ll talk to him. You shouldn’t have to deal with his moods.”

She shook her head, “I don’t mind his moods, not really. And I know this has to be hard on him, but you should see him with Ella! I was trying to get him to drink tea _all day_ and then she waltzes in and suggests making a brew the way her grandmother used to and _oh did you know my grandmother Joanna, she was a beauty but probably too old for you_ and suddenly he’s drinking jasmine tea all but sticking his pinky out.”

That was a lot to take in so he just asked the obvious question, “We have jasmine tea?”

“You do now,” Gilly said and then they said in tandem, “Because Ella brought it.” He chuckled as Gilly shook her head, “I adore her but the way he does is _pissing me off_.”

Robb mussed her hair, “He _loves_ you, he just doesn’t know Ella as well so he can’t act the same way towards her. I’ll talk to him.”

She waved her hand, “Don’t bother. I’m just being a baby.”

Gilly was never a baby about anything and Brynden really had been in rare form since coming home from the hospital. He got it, he really did. He was a nightmare when he had so much as a cold, so the fear that had come with his collapse combined with the fact that it had been recommended that he stay with him for the next two to three weeks and all the other restrictions had obviously made him contend with his own mortality.

Even still, it was no excuse to take it out on Gilly, who though was a part of the family was also an employee of the family and deserved respect for both.

“You’re not,” he promised, “And you really should get out of here. Don’t you have a date with, wait, what’s his name again?”

Gilly rolled her eyes, “Nice try.”

He sighed, “Alright if you won’t tell me his name, at least tell me what he’s like. That he’s good to you.”

“He’s…,” Gilly started and then trailed off, “Wonderful. I’ve never met anyone like him.” She smiled, “He thinks I’m beautiful.”

“Well, you _are_ beautiful,” he pointed out.

She shook her head, “He sees something in me that no one else does,” then looked at him, “Not even _you_ or Wes, though I love you both dearly.”

“And you see it in him too?” Robb asked. She nodded, a slow smile spreading across her face, “Then Gilly, what the hell are you waiting for? I’m sorry, I know I tease you a lot about it but… if he’s as great as you say… why can’t I know who he is?”

“Because,” she started, her mouth opening and her eyes looking to the ceiling the way they always did when she was thinking hard about something, “I… he’s in my life. Not just in a romantic way. He’s someone that I know apart from that, who I see… often. And that complicates things.”

“Do I know him?” Robb asked. Her eyes widened, “I do! Ohhhh this is going to be fun.”

She giggled, “See? If I told you I’d deprive you of your sick little game.”

He smirked but then said firmly, “Gilly… if he’s important to you… don’t worry about it being weird for anyone else. I mean it… Unless it is Theon. And then I’m locking you in a tower and throwing away the key.”

“Give me that bowl,” she urged, “I need to vomit.”

“Ha _ha_ ,” he grinned.

She smiled and hopped up on the counter, fiddling with her fingers. He didn’t want to push her any further, so he just kept doing the dishes, waiting for her to say whatever it is that she wanted to.

“It’s justdifficult,” she said finally, “When the person who is suddenly very important to you, is already important to people you love.”

Robb’s stomach churned as he heard Ella’s laughter from the other room.

“Yeah,” he agreed, looking at her, “It is.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I'd love to know what you think?


	14. Chapter 14

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> This chapter is short & sweet!

One of the best things about Brynden staying with them was that he could take runs outside in the morning. The air had gotten cooler, but it was nothing like what it would be like in the North this time of year, and it felt good to get fresh air and take new routes rather than just run in the unnatural light of his basement on the boring treadmill.

He took Grey Wind with him and he knew that when his uncle moved back out it would be a rude awakening for his dog. Though Grey Wind still slept with Wes, every morning for the past five he would wake up with his dog on top of him, his leash already in his mouth.

This morning Grey Wind had lead him towards the river so they ran along the path where Robb would take Wes to ride his bike. They did a long loop, and Robb delighted in the leaves crunching underneath his feet as Grey Wind delighted in crunching them in his mouth.

Robb let go of Grey Wind’s leash when they turned onto his drive and he broke out into a sprint. His dog was too quick for him though, and left him in his dust.

“You win this time,” Robb huffed, pointing at him.

Grey Wind won every time, but his dog was too classy to point that out.

He took off Grey Wind’s leash and they walked inside, Grey Wind trotting over to the food bowl that Brynden would have filled by now.

Robb walked into the kitchen and saw Brynden sitting at the kitchen table, wearing his bathrobe and raising a mug to his lips.

“That better be your first cup,” Robb noted.

Though the doctor hadn’t ruled out coffee entirely, he had been told to severely limit his intake. Especially to eliminate the afternoon cup he was having. That was one reason that Robb suspected Brynden had been so grouchy in the first week of his release from the hospital. Though he probably _missed_ steak and whiskey, he was in _withdrawal_ for caffeine.

Robb went to the pot to pour himself a cup but found it empty.

“You finished a whole pot?” he asked.

“No,” Brynden grumbled. Robb looked over at him and his uncle averted his gaze, “It’s not coffee.”

Robb had no desire to be his jailer, but he also had no desire to see Brynden lying in a hospital bed again.

Though Brynden could be grouchy, he wasn’t a liar, so Robb asked, “What is it?”

“Jsdajine terea,” Brynden answered before taking another sip.

“What was that?” Robb smirked, having a good idea but wanting him to say it nonetheless.

“JAS- _min_ tea,” Brynden enunciated for him.

“Oh,” Robb nodded.

“Don’t _oh_ me,” Brynden said, “It’s good for my heart, and digestion. You ought to drink some.”

“My digestion is fine,” Robb scoffed as he set about making a pot of coffee.

“Really?” Brynden asked, “Guess you’re backed up in some other way.”

“ _That_ ,” Robb pointed at him, “Is inappropriate.”

Brynden squinted his eyes, “If only… if only there was a woman… a beautiful woman… out there, somewhere –“

“Please don’t break into song,” Robb pleaded.

“The next time you see her, will you ask her where she got this?” Brynden smirked.

“Why don’t you ask her yourself?” Robb wondered. “Give you another reason to talk to her.”

“ _I_ don’t need to manufacture reasons to talk to her,” Brynden noted.

“Neither do I!” Robb argued.

“Right, right, right, right,” Brynden nodded, “Just reasons not to _be_ with her.”

Robb looked at his uncle and wondered what the doctor would say about him moving out.

The truth was, in spite of Brynden’s moods, he and Wes had loved having him there. Every night he told them stories about his grandfather and him growing up, or the mischief his perfect mother had gotten up to.

It was only surrounding Ella that it had been somewhat of a problem. If Gilly noticed anything between them, she was far too gentle to say anything. Brynden, on the other hand, was not, and he made it perfectly clear what an idiot he thought Robb was being. No matter how many times he tried to explain it, it didn’t do any good.

It didn’t help, of course, that it had grown increasingly difficult to explain it to himself.

When she wasn’t around it was easier. He’d watched videos of Jeyne or think about the picture of Trystane in Ella’s kitchen. He’d think of their sons who loved each other so dearly, and the special place Ella had taken in Wes’ heart. There were so many good reasons, then, when he was alone.

And then the moment he was in her presence they all faded away.

No, they didn’t fade away, they were _pushed_ away. By her soft, golden hair and the dimples that appeared when she smiled. Her sweet, teasing voice and her unadulterated kindness.

In fact, when he was with her, some of the reasons that he _shouldn’t_ do anything morphed into reasons that he should. Watching their sons together felt so right, and the way Wes would climb into her lap and play with her hair, or the way Cole would tug on his hand and say _I have a secret to tell you_.

He wanted her, there was no question. His entire body craved her, but it was more than that. Too much more.

“I’m going to go shower,” Robb scoffed.

“I’ll bet you are,” Brynden noted.

“Inappropriate!” Robb chided once again.

He was about to head out of the kitchen when Brydnen stopped him with an, “Oh.” Robb turned towards him, not really in the mood for anymore teasing about Ella, but instead his uncle said, “I was wondering if you could make yourself scarce tonight?”

“Scarce?” Robb asked. Brynden nodded. “What do you and Wes have planned?”

“Him too,” Brynden noted. Robb crossed his arms and Brynden shrugged, “I’d like to have a _guest_ over and it is bad enough I am staying with my nephew without her seeing it for herself.”

Robb tried to fight his smile but he couldn’t, so his voice was a little less stern than he’d like when he asked, “Let me get this straight. You would like me and my son to _make ourselves scarce_ in our own home, so that you can entertain a lady guest?”

“Yes,” Brynden answered.

“Who is she?” Robb asked.

His Uncle had never settled down, but he knew that he’d had his share of relationships over the years. His mother had always called them _liaisons_ , which made them sound more sinister than Robb suspected they were.

“That would be – none of your business,” Brynden noted.

_Why is everyone so secretive all of a sudden? Brynden, Gi-_

It was too unreasonable a thought. Gilly was younger than _him_ , and it was Edmure who liked younger women not Brynden.

But even still, his and Gilly’s talk from last week reentered his mind. _It’s just difficult when the person that is suddenly very important to you is already important to people you love._ And all that bickering…

So he didn’t want to ask.

“It’s not Gilly is it?” Robb blurted out.

“Are you crazy?” Brynden chided. “She’s sixteen!”

“She’s twenty-seven,” Robb corrected him.

“What’s the difference?” Brynden asked, and Robb smiled at that, “Go take your shower. _Is it Gilly?_ What’s the matter with you?”

Robb chuckled as he went up the stairs. The morning took on its routine after that. He showered and dressed and answered emails before waking Wes up. They had breakfast and got Wes dressed and waved goodbye to Brynden and Grey Wind and then piled into the car.

On the way to school, he and Wes talked about what to do that weekend and what they should do when everyone came down for Thanksgiving.

Though usually they would return to Winterfell for the holidays, the doctors didn’t want Brynden to travel yet so the entire Stark brood was descending on them. Sansa would usually stay with him, but as Brynden lived in the Tully’s ancestral home, she would commandeer that instead. Rickon, Bran and his Dad were staying with him, while Jon, Sansa, Lya and Arya were staying at Brynden’s.

Since Theon had found out they were all coming, and more importantly to him, Sansa was cooking, he’d cancelled his plans to return to the Iron Islands and would also be joining them. So would Uncle Edmure, and at least as of Monday, his girlfriend Roslin.

Once the decision had been made, Sansa had started sending him grocery lists immediately. She would still do a ton of shopping when she arrived, and likely bring down a suitcase full of kitchen supplies that she’d didn’t trust him and Brynden to have, but there were certain things he could get in the meantime that she was afraid of the stores running out of. He’d already reserved two turkeys and intended on leaving Wes with Brynden for a few hours over the weekend so that he could go knock out the rest.

“I _think_ we should take Uncle Rickon to the football game,” Wes told him.

Robb nodded, “I think that’s a great idea, honey.”

Rickon’s team played the Saturday before Thanksgiving, always had, but the local high school team played on Thanksgiving itself. They had one of the oldest rivalries in the country with a neighboring town and there were bets taken and merchandise sold and usually a fist fight or two. The game itself was supposedly pretty great though, and he and Wes like to go some Saturday afternoons in the Fall.

His Dad, Jon and Rickon would watch anything, and he knew they’d get very quickly into the spirit of the day. And Sansa would be very grateful to have them all out of the kitchen.

“Want to know something crazy?” Robb asked Wes as he opened the car door for him.

“I love crazy!” Wes quoted Frozen for the first time in a while.

“In _one week_ from today, you are going to be five years old,” Robb informed him.

“I’m so big,” Wes agreed with a self-satisfied smile.

“So big,” Robb agreed, and then picked him up, “But not _too_ big to be carried like a _littttttle_ baby.”

“Daddy!” Wes squealed in delight.

Robb knew that in a year or two Wes wouldn’t let him do this, so he carried him up the school steps into his kindergarten class.

It was nice to see Wes greeting more and more kids each week. He had his favorites, of course. Cole was without equal, though Sophie was the next dearest to him. But there was Will and Celia and Brad and Hunter too.

Robb waved to some of the parents and then found his way over to Ella who was standing with Mr. Tarly. She looked beautiful, her golden hair swept up into a high ponytail, wearing a light purple exercise zip-up and yoga pants.

“Good morning,” he greeted them both.

“Hey,” she smiled brightly.

“Hello Robb,” Mr. Tarly said to his shoulder.

Robb glanced meaningfully at Ella and she rolled her eyes. Unlike him, she did _not_ think that Mr. Tarly was weird with him.

He and Ella got Cole and Wes settled and then walked out of the school together as usual.

“Are there any restaurants Cole likes?” he asked.

“Umm,” Ella thought about it, “Not really… we don’t eat out very often. Why?”

“Uhhum,” Robb laughed, “Get ready for this one. Brynden has asked that Wes and I make ourselves scarce tonight.”

Ella turned to look at him, her face the picture of confusion. It gave him the opportunity to watch as understanding dawned on her and then watched as the dimple appeared, first in her left cheek and then in her right.

“Good for _him_ ,” she smiled.

Robb chuckled, “I know. He’s an inspiration, truly. But yeah, maybe we’ll just get pizza and I’ll take him to a movie or something. There’s that new one out, right?”

Ella nodded, not needing further clarification, “Yeah. Marg – my sister-in-law,” she clarified unnecessarily, “Took my niece to see it. She said it was a bit mature, but Lenny is only three so… I’m sure it’ll be fine for Wes. But…”

“But?” he asked, hope seizing in his stomach before he could beat it back down.

“Well I don’t want to get in the way of your boys night out or anything,” Ella smiled, “But I’m making tacos tonight.”

“Wes’ favorite,” Robb noted. “Are you sure? I promise I was not trying to finagle an invitation.”

“Of course, I’m sure,” Ella nodded, and then glanced up at him, “And you know you never need to, right?”

****

“Mommy can’t we stay here?” Cole asked her.

“No, baby,” Myrcella stroked his cheek, “We are going to Highgarden to be with _our_ family.”

Cole pouted slightly and she knew that he was resisting the urge to point out that the Tyrell’s weren’t their family. He didn’t understand the nuance of it but he knew they were something other to them. He loved Marg and Lenny, and even Loras who was technically his great-uncle, but the Tyrell’s lived so differently to them that Cole was always exhausted when they came home. As was she.

Even still, Marg had been kind enough to invite them and it was tradition.

Plus, she noted, “Uncle Gendry will be there.”

“Oh yeah!” Cole grinned, his pout entirely forgotten at the prospect of seeing him.

“What?” Wes asked, then looked at Robb, “Can we go to Haggaden?”

“No,” Robb laughed, reminding him, “Because our _whole_ family is coming to see you.”

Wes and Cole looked at one another, the pair of them having a silent conversation. It seemed to her, at least, like they were contemplating the possibilities of time travel, so that they could both be with their own families and each other’s too.

She glanced at Robb and found that he was already looking at her. Her cheeks warmed and she smiled briefly at him before popping a grape in her mouth.

The boys had finished their dinner, so they ran off to play while she and Robb cleaned up. Or rather, while Robb cleaned up and pushed her out of the way anytime she tried to do something.

“So, do you have any idea who it is?” she asked him.

He didn’t need further clarification and shook his head, “No idea, and he wasn’t saying. Everyone is being so secretive all of a sudden.”

Ella smiled, “Gilly still hasn’t caved, huh?”

“No!” Robb all but exploded, “It’s so _annoying_.”

“Oh, you love the drama,” she teased, and he looked at her in mock horror.

The truth was, Myrcella had a theory about Gilly’s mystery man. If she was right, she understood why Gilly was being so secretive about it. Not that Robb would care, at all, because it really wasn’t a big deal, but she understood why Gilly felt it was. Especially with her feelings being so strong.

The next time the boys had a playdate, she fully intended on asking her. Not because she wanted to invade her privacy but because she wanted to help assure her that there was no reason to hide it.

Even still, that in no way meant that she’d put Robb out of his misery.

When Robb started doing the dishes, he acquiesced and let her sit up on the counter and help dry the ones that weren’t going in the dishwasher. The sounds of the boys playing in the other room and the soft running water created a melody of contentment around them, and they talked on and off when one had something to say, not forcing it when they didn’t.

After a while she guided them onto the subject of Wes’ birthday. 

“Five,” Robb said, shaking his head, “He’s going to be _five_. Why does that feel bigger than four?”

Myrcella smiled, “I don’t know. But it does. It did for me anyway.”

“Glad I’m not alone,” Robb told her.

He said it lightly, but their positions were so similar to the first time he’d done so that it felt anything but. He was standing at the sink, she sitting on the counter, close to one another in the warmth of a kitchen where a meal had just been shared.

It had only been a few weeks, yet it felt like they’d been in this position many times since then. And as always there was that comfort that was there, amidst the nerves and hopes and all the rest.

“No,” her voice sounded thick to her, “You’re not alone…”

His eyes met hers as though he was remembering it too. As though even in this, she wasn’t alone.

Robb handed her the bowl he’d just been washing and she dried it, before placing it beside her with the other things ready to be put away.

“So how is the party coming along?” she asked, “Anything I can do to help?”

“Yes,” he determined and turned to her with a grin, “You can never _again_ send me the website for an online party store. I’m going to have to move some money around if I keep this up.”

She laughed, “It _is_ a bit addicting, I agree. They just have such great stuff.” Robb nodded and she picked at a thread on her sweater, her stomach churning with nerves. “There is actually something about Wes’ birthday that I wanted to talk to you about.”

Robb’s brow furrowed and he looked at her, “You guys can still come, right?”

“Of course,” she assured him, the relief on his face giving her the confidence to ask what she wanted to. “So, I know the birthday party is on Saturday, and I’m sure that you will want to do something just the two of you or with Gilly or whomever on his actual birthday on Thursday… but I was sort of thinking… I was sort of thinking that maybe on Friday you’d come here, and we could do a little birthday dinner?”

Robb looked at her, his blue eyes wandering over her face as though trying to understand her meaning, “You want to do a birthday dinner for Wes here?”

She nodded, “And it could be just us or we could invite Gilly and Theon and Brynden…whatever you wanted. I just… Well for one I found this cake recipe that I think he’ll just die over and for another I really would like to… do this.” Robb wasn’t looking at her now, he was looking at the sink, the water running over his hands as he held a platter in them. She felt a pit in her stomach and quickly said, “But if I’m overstepping please tell me I don’t know what traditions you have and -,” Robb just kept looking down at the sink. “Robb… are you listening to me?”

“No,” he told her, his voice hoarse.

For a moment her mind went to the last time he’d spoken to her with anything resembling that tone. She’d unknowingly been an idiot and she couldn’t help but fear she’d somehow done it again.

“No?” she asked.

She wanted to tell him that she was sorry for whatever it was she’d said, that she and Cole just loved Wes and that a dinner before a birthday party had always been her favorite birthday tradition. That if he wanted they’d just come to the party like any other guests, even though that wasn’t how she felt. Even though that was never how he treated her.

In fact, she would have told him all of those things if Robb hadn’t all but dropped the platter in the sink and then placed both of his wet hands on the counter on either side of her legs and touched his lips gently to hers.

It was hardly a kiss at all, a brush, nothing more, and yet her blood started singing in her veins.

A whisper of a kiss, that first touch of his lips, gave way to the second when he pressed his more firmly against hers. They were soft, his, but before she could get used to them, he’d pulled away from her.

“I’m sorry,” he was saying, “I know I said I’d tell you when I was ready but I couldn’t really think straight until –“

He kept talking. She knew he was talking. She was watching his lips move. The lips that had just been pressed against hers. He was looking at her in concern and she didn’t know why.

_Did he not want to kiss her again? Did he regret it? Had he not meant to?_

She heard something then, something muffled that sounded like her name.

Focusing, she heard him say, “Ella? Are you listening to me?”

“No,” she admitted.

“No?” he asked.

She shook her head, “I’m sorry, I wasn’t ready.” It was instantaneous, the regret in his eyes and she realized her poor choice of words. She reached out and gripped his shoulders, “No, I just…”

_Didn’t kiss you back._

She couldn’t say that, though. So instead, she let one of her hands move up his neck until it could rest on his cheek. She could feel his stubble and his cheekbone and the clench of his jaw as his eyes closed, leaning his face against her hand.

Myrcella closed hers too and leaned forward, until her lips touched his once again. She must have surprised him because his lips opened, a breath escaping them and her own closed around his bottom one.

Gently she felt his upper lip close around hers and then release it, taking her bottom lip between his and sucking on it in such a way that made her see stars.

The hand still on his shoulder moved across his back until it could grip the other from behind and she felt his arms wrap around her, taking hold of her. She could feel his warm, soapy hands grip her as their lips wandered over one another’s.

His body was leaning into hers, over hers, but his arms kept her steady as his tongue entered her mouth and touched hers. The hand on his cheek had a mind of its own and moved back into his soft curls and then he was kissing her deeply.

She pulled him closer to her and she felt one of his hands move off of her waist and down to her leg and squeeze it and _pull_ it and –

“MOMMY!” they heard and sprung apart. “Can Wes sleepover tonight?”

“N-no baby,” she called back. Robb was staring at her and so she could see as his eyes, which had turned black, eased back to their normal blue. “It’s a school night.”

Ever since the night that Brynden had gone to the hospital, Cole and Wes had been asking for a sleepover. She and Robb hadn’t talked about it yet, but she figured he had as many concerns as she did. That had been an extenuating circumstance, but Cole for one still woke with nightmares a couple of times a week and she had no idea how he’d react to sleeping in a house without her.

She heard grumbling but the boys didn’t come into the kitchen.

“It’s getting late,” Robb cleared his throat.

She shook her head, and confessed, “I’m not okay to drive.”

A wide, surprised smile overtook his face and he said, “That’s okay… because this is your house.”

She closed her eyes in embarrassment and felt his lips at her temple.

“Are you okay to drive?” she asked.

He tucked a lock of hair behind her ear and rubbed the shell of it, before telling her, “I can’t remember ever being more awake, Ella.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Did I rush it too soon?? I've been dying to do this for CHAPTERS but I really don't want it to feel rushed. Hopefully it felt rewarding!


	15. Chapter 15

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Ahhhhh the responses to the last chapter just made my heart sing! I'm so so glad their first kiss made you all so happy. It made me so happy!!
> 
> I'll respond to all the comments but I wanted to get this posted before I started work today. For some reason, I really struggled with this chapter even though I had so many of the moments in it planned for so long. Apologies if it is a bit clunky!
> 
> Oh and a number of you wanted to know about Cat in the last chapter so that will be answered in this chapter.
> 
> I do warn you though, fluff is coming...

“Okay,” Robb looked at Ella firmly. Her jade eyes went up to his and he asked, “Are you _seriously_ telling me that wasn’t weird?”

Those jade eyes rolled and she sighed, “Yes, Robb. I am telling you _for the hundredth time_ , no I don’t think Mr. Tarly was being _off_ with you.” Her eyes lit up before she asked, “Why? Did one of you see the other naked or something?”

“What is the matter with you?” he asked. The smile appeared quickly on her face and he wanted to kiss it right off of her. They were walking out of the school though so that wouldn’t be appropriate. Besides, he wasn’t sure that she wanted him to kiss it off of her. So, he simply reminded her, “We’re not in a sitcom from the 90s.”

“Pity,” she lamented.

Robb tore his eyes away from her pout and shook his head, “He won’t look me in the eye.”

Ella was silent for a moment and he looked back over at her, wondering if she’d noticed it too.

She saw him looking at her and she shrugged, “He wouldn’t look me in the eye for the first few weeks of school. That’s just how he is.”

“Yeah, but you know,” Robb dismissed that.

“What?” she asked.

“Ella,” Robb chided, looking at her meaningfully, “ _You know_.”

“Robb,” she mimicked him, making her eyes wider. She was so adorable it felt like a physical assault. “ _I don’t._ ”

That was only in the back of his mind though as he wondered if she was being serious. She was certainly looking at him like she was serious.

“You really don’t, huh?” he asked.

“Do I have a reputation for being mean or something?” she wondered.

“No,” he rolled his eyes, “You’re just plain old gorgeous and everyone knows it.” It was like he’d flipped a switch, and he watched as a trail of pink wandered up her cheeks, “She blushes. I say an inarguable fact, and she blushes.”

“You blushed when I told you everyone thinks you’re _fine_ ,” she grinned.

“Well, that’s different,” he noted.

“Why?” she wondered.

“Because we were talking about _me_ then,” he deadpanned.

Her giggle filled the air around them and it beckoned a chuckle of his own. Everything felt warm all of a sudden and he wondered what she would do if he took her hand. They’d held hands before, but it was before. Before he’d kissed her, before she’d kissed him. Before he knew what her waist felt like in his hands or that her skin was exactly as soft as it looked.

He hadn’t been lying when he told her he’d never felt more awake. He’d hardly slept last night, his mind running over it again and again. And not just the kiss but what it could mean, the fact that he’d done it. He’d expected to feel guilt, and he did, and concern about what it could mean for Wes and Cole if they were to continue it, there were a hundred thousand different worries in his mind, but more than any of them he felt want.

A want to know if she wanted to do it again. A want to do it again. A want, a want, a want, for _her_.

That was not going to be resolved in the parking lot of their sons school though.

So as they got to her car he said, “Alright, how about this? _You_ go to my meeting and Selmy’s today and I’ll go-“

“Tell Mrs. Chambers that the band she wanted for the annual Cancer Benefit refuses to play in the hotel where its located because of their hiring policies?” Ella prompted.

He grinned, “New plan. I’ll go to _my_ meeting and you have a very nice day.”

She laughed, “I thought so.”

He was about to let her go, and then he remembered he had something that could be answered in the parking lot of their sons’ school, “Oh hey! Favor.”

She smiled, and asked in her melodic voice, “ _Yes_?”

“Stay for dinner tonight,” he asked, though he said it like a statement.

Cole was going over to have a playdate with Wes, and he knew that Ella would be there in the afternoon too. Gilly, Brynden and Wes had all suggested they stay, which was convenient because that was exactly what he wanted too.

“We can’t come for dinner _every_ night,” she pointed out.

“I agree,” he said, though he didn’t. “And you didn’t come last night so I’d say you’re due.”

That blush rose on her cheeks again and he wondered if she was going to remind him that they had dinner together last night, just at her house. It seemed like she considered it and then thought better of it and for a moment he was afraid that she didn’t want to repeat it and this could really seemed like he was asking her out in a pretty unromantic way and she didn’t know how to say no.

But then she smiled, “Is this _you_ asking or _Gilly_ asking.”

“Well…,” Robb pursed his lips, his eyes looking upwards, and then grinning. “Which one has a better chance of succeeding?”

She laughed, “We’d love to.” Then narrowed her eyes at him, “Though I _do_ suspect this is because of Brynden.”

“I have no idea what you’re talking about,” he lied, opening her car door for her, “Goodbye Miss Ella.”

“Don’t start,” she giggled in such a way that made him think she wouldn’t mind so much if he did.

“Oh, I haven’t,” he grinned, whispering in her ear, “Not yet.”

He felt her shiver against him and it became really difficult not to kiss her, but she skirted by him, the side of her arm brushing briefly against his chest as she did and then settled into the driver’s seat. He kept his hand on the door so that she couldn’t slam it shut.

She looked up at him and her mouth opened before she closed it again and when she spoke, he didn’t think she said what she’d wanted to.

She merely noted, “You know, he’s not that bad.”

“To _you_ ,” Robb agreed.

“Well, I don’t baby him so much,” she pointed out.

“Ella,” Robb scoffed, “I could act exactly like you and it wouldn’t make him any nicer to me. Do you know why that is?”

“Do I want to know?” she asked.

“Probably not,” he agreed, then grinned at her, “Have a nice day, _Miss Ella_.”

He closed her door to the sound of her laughing, and he walked towards his car as she drove off. Robb got in his own car and drove to the office.

There were only a couple of hours until his appointment with Dr. Selmy, and Aggie had booked it for his _executive time_. He used it to catch up on emails, they always piled to astronomical levels towards the end of each week. Thursday evenings always seemed to be one of the busiest for his inbox, everyone trying to get things off of their plate in advance of the weekend, but too close to it that someone wouldn’t be able to turn it around and give it back to them.

Brynden was working from home still, and he went onto messenger so that they could talk about a group of emails Edmure was on with a bunch of the regional heads. They seemed to be going down a bit of a rabbit hole and Brynden just replied _Let me handle it._ Though he knew Brynden’s methods wouldn’t be exactly the same as his, the ends would, and he appreciated when anyone took _anything_ off his to-do list.

Within about an hour he was able to get his inbox down from 500 to 200. His goal every Friday was under 50 but that never actually happened except one time when the server had gone down.

He texted Gilly and let her know that Ella and Cole would be staying for dinner and she responded with the hand in the air emoji.

At 11:15 he stood up from his desk and turned his phone to private so that only Gilly and Wes’ school could get through, and waved goodbye to Aggie. Selmy’s office was only a few minutes from his, so he got there a bit early and grabbed a coffee. He wasn’t sure if it was appropriate to get one for his therapist and what the man would want it if was, so he somewhat guiltily carried his into the reception area.

Dr. Selmy greeted him as normal and welcomed him into his office. He sipped his coffee and sat in his usual seat.

“So, how are we this week?” Selmy asked.

“I don’t know,” Robb told him. Selmy looked at him, so Robb told him, “I kissed Ella. Last night.”

Selmy nodded studiously, “And you’re feeling what about that?”

“I don’t know,” Robb repeated.

“Because you feel guilty?” Selmy asked.

“No,” Robb shook his head, and then amended, “Well yes, I do. But we sort of knew that was coming, right? It’s weird. I do feel… odd about it but… I expected to feel worse. Is that… is that bad?”

“Do you want to feel worse?” Selmy asked.

“No,” Robb admitted, “I think I just had it built up in my head, you know? Because I’ve kissed other women since, but no one that I’ve had feelings for… so…”

“So maybe the guilt you were fearing, you’d already felt?” Selmy suggested, “Because as you say, it isn’t the _kissing_ that is new but the feelings that go with it. And you’ve been feeling bad about that for weeks.”

“Yeah,” Robb nodded, “I think you’re right.”

“So…,” Selmy prompted, “You don’t know how to feel about it because it didn’t feel the way you thought it might?”

“ _No_ ,” Robb shook his head, flashes from the night before appearing before his eyes. Ella’s fingers in his hair, her waist in his hands, her tongue against his. And that sweet, stunned confession. He’d made her forget where she was. “Well… I guess sort of. It was better.”

“My favorite word,” Selmy smirked. “So?”

Robb sighed, “I don’t know if she wants to do it again.”

“Ah,” Selmy nodded. “Well Robb I fear that is one problem I can’t help you with. She’s the only one who can tell you that.”

“Yeah,” he agreed, his stomach churning. “I’ll see her tonight.”

“Hmm,” Selmy nodded.

“If she does…,” Robb started. “If she does… I’m nervous about… getting ahead of myself.”

“How do you mean?” Selmy asked.

Robb took a sip of coffee and then placed it down on the table beside him.

“I guess I mean that… she’s really something else,” he confessed, “I mean let’s just look at the reason I kissed her in the first place -,” Selmy smirked and Robb smiled, “I know, I’m talking like you. So, we were at her house for dinner, right?” Selmy nodded, “And we are talking about Wes’ birthday, which is next Thursday. Five years old. Oof that one _hurts_. And we’re talking about his party and all this stuff and she tells me, well, she asks me, if she can make a dinner for Wes the night before his birthday party. For the four of us, or whoever me or Wes would want. You know um… she’s just… so sweet with him. You know how we chaperoned together and she made him those cookies? Or how she took care of him when Brynden was in the hospital. She just…”

“Loves him,” Barristan said simply.

Monumentally.

Robb swallowed hard and nodded. Ella had never told him that, but it was obvious. It was so obvious that he wasn’t sure how he hadn’t noticed before.

“She loves him,” Robb repeated.

Selmy sat there and let him think about that. He wasn’t sure why it felt so different for her to love him, than it did for Theon or Gilly to. Neither of them was related to Wes either and they loved him. And that meant the world to him. It really did.

And yet.

“She loves him, my son,” Robb repeated. He shook his head, “I’m sorry, I don’t know why that’s… it’s obvious, you know and um, it doesn’t change anything it just… I guess I knew that you know, that’s why I was just… I’ve wanted to kiss her for so long and then it was her talking about having that dinner and it was just so thoughtful and so her… but I guess I realized it then. That she loves him I mean. And I just couldn’t stop myself.”

Selmy nodded, “Why do you think that is what pushed you over the edge?”

Robb shrugged, “Wes is the most important person in my life. He’s always going to be the most important person in my life. And Ella is so many things. Kind, most of all, but smart and poised and silly and fun and… excruciatingly… no I mean… _excruciatingly_ beautiful, but she’s a mom first. Just like I’m a dad first. And you should see them together, her and Wes I mean. It’s like… she’s his own personal sunshine, I sound like a sap I know but he sees her and just brightens. And I think… I think knowing that she feels the same way about him made it feel… okay to feel the way I feel about her?”

Selmy smiled, “You’re an excellent father, from what I can see. So, it makes perfect sense that you’d only allow yourself to fall for someone who is a goodness in your son’s life. And she sounds like a wonderful mother, to Cole, I mean, from everything you’ve said.”

“She is,” Robb confirmed. “She’s gentle and loving but she’s not one of those people that just let’s her kid walk all over her, you know um… And Cole is just… the greatest kid. He’s such a good friend to Wes, and he’s got such a loyal heart and the kid,” Robb grinned, “He’s got _shtick_.”

Dr. Selmy grinned, “Sounds a bit like you actually.”

Robb blushed, and then realized, “He is a bit. I mean, superior obviously, but yeah, he reminds me a bit more of me when I was younger than Wes does. Definitely the more mischievous of the two. And a flirt – oof he turns Gilly into a puddle.”

Selmy chuckled, “And you love him.”

“Yeah,” Robb agreed, and shrugged, “But he’s easy to love. As is Wes, so again, I shouldn’t be surprised, and it shouldn’t be that big of a deal that she does.”

“I disagree,” Selmy said.

“Shocking,” Robb teased.

His therapist fixed him with a look and said, “Just because Wes is deserving of love doesn’t mean that everybody will give it to him. _And_ just because someone loves someone else, doesn’t mean that they would do the things Ella does. People can be very passive about that, actually. Whereas it seems like Ella loves actively, not just because of who she is, but because of who Wes is. It’s one thing to be loved and quite another thing to _feel_ loved. Do you think Wes feels loved by her?”

“Absolutely,” Robb said before he’d even completely processed the question.

“Isn’t that a big deal?” Selmy asked.

“Yeah,” Robb agreed. “That’s… everything.” Then shook his head, “But you’re not helping.”

“I’m not?” Selmy asked.

“No!” Robb argued, “You’re supposed to be helping me _not_ get ahead of myself.”

“Oh,” Selmy nodded, “Right. And why was that?”

“Because I’ve kissed her once? Well twice… and we’re both only just ready… if she even is… and… we’ve only kissed twice,” Robb told him and then thought about it more, “And even if she does want to kiss me again… She… she could… she could _want_ to kiss me again but something else could overpower that. Like her guilt? Or maybe she isn’t ready, you know maybe I rushed her? And even if she is… I haven’t dated _anyone_ since Jeyne. And our lives are intermingled, you know? So, I don’t want us to… rush into anything. You know I… I want… I don’t know what I want.”

“Well, you do know what you want,” Selmy argued. “Some of it anyway. So why don’t we start there.”

“I want Wes protected,” Robb said, and Selmy nodded, “And Cole, too. And I want her to feel okay, and like I’m not pushing her. And I want… I want her. But I want time to get used to that.”

Selmy nodded, “Those things are not contradictory. So, I’d say you’re in a very good place.”

“ _If_ she wants to kiss me again,” Robb noted. “If she doesn’t…”

“Then this was a waste of a perfectly good session?” Selmy prompted.

Robb chuckled, “Yeah, exactly.”

They talked about a few other things and Selmy wished him luck and then sent him on his way. He picked up lunch on his way back to the office and ate it while on a conference call before heading to another meeting.

When he got back to his office he worked on getting through more of his emails and got his inbox down to 100. Lower than he’d had in some time.

Looking at his calendar he saw that Aggie had scheduled more executive time between 4 and 6, because there were a few younger employees that liked to prove their worth by booking meetings with him at the end of the week, as though they should get a medal for being at their desks.

He didn’t blame them. Tully Corp. was a family company, and though they were vigilant about hiring from within, with him, Edmure and Brynden as a triumvirate of sorts, there were only so many promotions for people not in the family. He was trying to improve upon it, his Grandfather had always taken the _Family, Duty, Honor_ a little too literally in his opinion, and create more opportunities to retain talent.

Even still, he was grateful that Aggie had done so because most of those meetings involved a lot of self-congratulations, deserving or not, and very little substance.

Just after 3:30 his phone started buzzing. He was in the middle of a few emails but it could be Gilly so he looked at it.

His emails were entirely forgotten when he saw the name on his caller ID. _Ella Martell._

His stomach churned and for some reason he smoothed his tie and then answered, “Hey Ella.”

“Hi,” she offered back. She was speaking quietly. “Is this a bad time?”

“No there’s no such thing for you,” he told her honestly. “How are the boys doing?”

“They’re good,” she promised, a parent first and foremost just like he said. Then added, “Wes told me I looked _beeayoutiful_ today. You’re raising a flirt.”

Robb chuckled, “I’m raising an honest man. Besides, if anyone’s teaching him to be a flirt it’s that rogue of yours.” She didn’t try to deny it so he asked, “What’s up?”

“So um,” she all but whispered and he raised the volume on his phone, “No pressure or anything and we can just… move past it. But… do you think… well had you planned… onkissingmeagain?”

Of all the questions in the world he thought she might ask, that was not one of them.

Even still he knew exactly what his answer was, “Yes. If you want me to.”

He held his breath while he waited for her answer, so it all came out like a sigh when she did.

“I want you to,” she told him, and he could hear the smile in her voice and it beckoned his own. “Sorry if I like… ruined the surprise. But you know I like to plan.”

He chuckled, “And yet I don’t see a spreadsheet about it in my email.”

She giggled and then it cut off quickly as though she was covering her mouth.

“So, what are you doing?” she whispered.

“Working,” he grinned and then said, “I think the more important question is _what are you doing?_ And why are you whispering?”

“Playing hide and seek,” she answered, and it all made sense, “Gilly and I are hiding, and the boys are seeking.”

“What place did you choose?” he whispered.

“Umm…,” she giggled quietly, “I’m laying down in the bathtub in the guest bedroom I stayed in.”

“Good choice,” he congratulated her softly.

The image of her, lying down in the bathtub, calling him to see if he wanted to kiss her again was making his cheeks hurt and his pulse race. He could imagine that Gilly had chosen a spot underneath the desk in his office – it was an old reliable for her and Wes always forgot to check there – and he could see the boys stalking through the house, using Grey Wind to sniff them out.

All he wanted was to be there too, instead of behind his desk having executive time or whatever the hell he was doing.

“Hey,” she whispered, “You’re whispering too.”

“I’m a team player,” he told her softly.

She giggled again, “Don’t make me laugh. Oh _shh someone’s coming_.”

He liked that she didn’t hang up on him, and that she’d clearly forgotten he was supposed to be working and that he was in it now. It was almost possible for him to hear her holding her breath and he waited and listened. In the background he could here Wes and Cole talking and then laughing.

“ _I think they’re gone_ ,” she informed him.

He was about to congratulate her when he remembered what Jon had taught Wes the last time they’d visited.

“El-“

“GOT YOU!” Wes yelled.

“AHHHH,” Ella squealed and then “ _Oooof_.” And then two giggles.

“Who are you talking to?” Wes asked.

“Your Daddy,” Ella told him.

For some reason, it struck him that she didn’t lie.

“HI DADDY I FOUND ELLA,” Wes yelled into the phone.

“Good job, honey,” Robb grinned, “She picked a good spot, huh?”

“Yeah! We found Gilly _for-ev-er_ ago,” Wes informed him. “What are you doing, Daddy? _Ahhahahah Ellayoucan’twashyourhairwithoutwater!_ ”

“But I want it to smell as _sweet as you_ ,” Ella cooed back.

“I’m coming home,” Robb decided, knowing that he’d never get anything done now. “You all better start hiding…”

“Run, Wes, runnnnn save yourself!” Ella suggested.

“AHHHHHHCOOLEEEEEEHIDEEEEEE,” Wes shouted, his voice getting quieter as he clearly ran away.

“You ought to go too, Ella,” he warned, “And you’ll have to do better than the guest bathtub if you don’t want me to find you.”

“And what if I do?” she teased.

He grabbed his keys.

***

“And just mix it?” she asked.

“Yeah, I’d just do it a little because you don’t want to overwork it,” Gilly warned.

Myrcella folded the ingredients in to one another, taking care not to mix them too much.

“Where’d you find this one?” she wondered.

“This one I just sort of made up,” Gilly shrugged, “I was in the mood for something but I couldn’t find the right recipe so I just sort of winged it.”

“Well, when you are looking for investors in your restaurant, count me in,” Myrcella informed her, tasting the mixture off her thumb, “Oh my _goodness_ you’re good.”

Gilly smiled, “It’s so simple, too.”

“Best things always are,” Myrcella confirmed.

She was serious, about the restaurant. Though Gilly could do anything she wanted, and she was wonderful with the boys, she had a gift for cooking. Cole had told her that Gilly was the _best cook ever_ and she agreed. She’d gladly choose a homecooked meal by her than dinner at any fancy restaurant there was.

They’d had a wonderful afternoon with the boys. Friday afternoons were always great for Cole because he knew that he had the whole weekend of fun ahead of him, and Wes and Gilly made it even better. Brynden had been working when they came in from school, but kept having to _just come in to get a glass of water_ or _are my glasses in here_ until they finally convinced him to take a break.

Robb had come home just after four and they’d all been hiding. She hadn’t wanted to make it too easy so she went into the oversized fireplace.

Grey Wind had given her up though and she tried to pull him in with her, but his tail kept poking out. Robb had found Cole first though and she could hear her son giggling when they spotted Grey Wind.

He’d looked so handsome in his suit and tie, as he had earlier at drop-off, and she would have felt self-conscious about her jeans and chunky grey sweater if his eyes hadn’t wandered over her the way they did. Like he was drinking her in.

It had been so long since she’d been looked at like that. Men tried to talk to her pretty often, but no one looked at her like that. Like it didn’t matter what she wore or that her hair was coming out of her ponytail or that she had green magic marker on her neck from when she’d been drawing dinosaurs with the boys. Like he didn’t want to, or maybe even couldn’t, look away.

They’d played more and then gone outside when it looked dry enough and played frisbee and Wes had ridden his bike in the drive while Cole borrowed his scooter.

Brynden and Robb were still outside with the boys while she and Gilly got dinner together.

“I wonder why he came home early,” Gilly said as she looked out the window.

“Because… I called him,” she admitted.

Gilly turned to look at her and Myrcella blushed. Gilly’s eyes widened and Myrcella nodded.

“Oh… _oh…_ oh!” Gilly squealed, “I _knew_ it.”

Myrcella laughed, “ _Shh_ I shouldn’t even be telling you. We kissed, once, well twice. Last night.”

Gilly did a little shimmy, “Oh we’ve been hoping and hoping and _hoping_.”

“We?” Myrcella prompted.

“Me and S- _oh,_ you’re good. Better than Robb, he better watch out around you,” Gilly nodded.

Myrcella giggled, “I promise only to use my powers for good. But… can we keep this between us?”

Gilly rolled her eyes, “Oh fine, if you insist. But why? It’s _wonderful_.” Myrcella fixed her with a look and Gilly agreed, “You’re right, I’m in no position to talk.”

“But you _could_ ,” Myrcella ventured, “If you wanted to. I mean… I think that… for instance… you’re wonderful… and Mr. Tarly is wonderful…”

“Myrcella!” Gilly admonished. “That’s it I’m warning Robb _this instant_.”

She laughed, “So I _am_ right?” Then hurried to assure her, “I won’t say anything. And we don’t have to talk about it if you’re not ready. I just… want you to know. That… it’s okay. If it is him. No one will mind.”

“Robb is really protective,” Gilly noted.

Myrcella couldn’t help but smile at that, she’d seen it herself.

“Yeah, he is,” she agreed. “But that’s just because he loves you and if Mr. Tarly is treating you nicely then he’ll be happy about it.”

“I know,” Gilly agreed. “And he is. Treating me nicely. Oh, I like him so much. And it’s all just gotten so… you know… out of hand.”

Myrcella was nodding along and then she heard the back door open, “Shh shh shhh.”

Robb walked in the door. He’d taken off his tie and unbuttoned the top button of shirt and just had his Barbour on over it. His eyes were bright, and the wind had whipped color into his cheeks and he was so beautiful that her hands started sweating and her heart started sputtering.

His eyes feel to hers and she watched as a slow smile overtook his face. She couldn’t help but smile back and then realized Gilly was still in the room and turned to her in embarrassment. Robb cleared his throat and looked at Gilly too.

And Gilly, sweetness itself, shouted at him, “I’m dating Mr. Tarly!”

“What?” Robb almost jumped back from the force of it, and then looked at her and then at Gilly and then back at her, “I told you!”

“What do you mean?” she asked innocently.

“What do I- _oh oh,_ ” he pointed at her, “We are speaking about this later, young lady.”

“She’s the one who is dating Mr. Tarly!” Myrcella pointed out.

“Hey!” Gilly exclaimed.

“Sorry,” Myrcella said immediately, because that was unlike her. Then stage-whispered, “ _He’s scary when he’s in dad-mode._ ”

Robb chuckled, and she couldn’t help but smile at him.

He turned toward Gilly, “It’s Mr. Tarly. The whole time?” Gilly nodded, and Robb shook his head, “That is so… _awesome_.”

“What?” Gilly all but fell back.

“He’s a great guy,” Robb shrugged, “And now that I know _why_ he was being so weird around me it totally makes sense. What did you tell him I would kill him or something?”

“No, he sort of came to that conclusion all on his own,” Gilly admitted and Myrcella giggled.

Robb grinned, “Well I won’t. Just tell him to be normal around me, okay? He keeps having conversations with my shoulders.”

Myrcella glanced over at him and couldn’t really blame Mr. Tarly. Robb’s shoulders were impressive.

_Snap out of it!_

As though she’d said that out loud Robb turned to her, his eyes alit with understanding. She glanced away and swallowed, wiping her hands on her jeans as subtly as she could.

“Ella can I talk to you for a second?” Robb asked. Clearly she hadn’t been subtle enough.

She glanced at Gilly who was suddenly very busy coating the chicken in the sauce she just made so she nodded. Robb stepped towards the hallway and cocked his head to the side, so she stepped around the counter and went beside him.

He started walking and she followed and then they were back in his office.

Robb closed the door and then looked at her, a blush running up and down his cheeks, “I just don’t want us to be interrupted.”

Her cheeks flushed at that and as though he’d heard himself, he closed his eyes and groaned, which helped her relax a bit.

“I know what you meant,” she promised.

“I should have told you,” he said and then looked at her, “That I was feeling… ready.”

She shrugged, “I should have told you.”

“So… you are?” he asked.

She took a deep breath, knowing that the honesty he always pulled from her would come out whether she allowed it to or not.

“I am… I’m ready to… try?” she asked him, as though he would know better than she what she meant. He nodded at her as though he just might and so she went on, “I know that I want to kiss you again. I know that I was really happy that you came home early. I’m just… I don’t know that I know anything beyond that. I’m sorry.”

“Don’t be sorry,” he shook his head, “I don’t want us to get ahead of ourselves.”

“Yeah,” she nodded, “That’s just it. But it doesn’t mean I’m not feeling… everything.”

He smiled, “Me too.”

She smiled back and he took a step forward, so she did too. And then another and another.

She was eye level with his chest and he was so big and smelled like such a man and it made her feel impossibly feminine. His fingers were gentle though, the two against her cheekbone and his thumb underneath her chin, tilting it upwards. Her eyes raised and the way he was looking at her made her insides turn to warm molasses.

His other hand went behind her head and pulled lightly on the hair elastic that was doing a terrible job of keeping her hair back. It fell out of the ponytail and Robb’s eyes followed it, his hand getting lost in it. Her own hands reached for him too and one rested on his chest, over his heart, and the other around his back.

His movements were such a contrast to the wild beat of his heart, everything was slow, steady. He had such a mastery over himself that she couldn’t replicate, gripping his shirt in her hands. His temple fell against hers and she nuzzled against it, her lips parting. She knew she must look desperate, but she was desperate.

Robb took pity on her and the thumb under her chin, nudged her upwards once again and then his lips were against hers. He let out a shaky breath and she pressed her lips against his and then he was kissing her in earnest.

She had lay awake all night thinking about this, his lips on hers, over hers, around hers. There had been other things she thought of too, but this was the thought that kept fighting its way back in.

The hand on his chest moved up to grip onto his shoulder, her body falling against his.

“Ella,” he murmured, and then his lips were on her throat and the lobe of her ear and the spot behind it. She moaned and shivered, and she heard the smile in his voice when he repeated, “Ella.”

“Don’t make fun of me,” she pleaded with a broken laugh.

“I’m not,” he said in her ear and then pulled away slightly, his blue eyes looking into hers, “I’m not. You’re just… you affect me so much and it… I like to know that I affect you too.”

She stood up on her tiptoes and brushed her lips against his and he took her not so subtle cue and kissed her once again.

He was moving her, and she didn’t know where she was going but she didn’t much mind, and then she felt his face lower.

She pulled away from him and saw that he was sitting on the arm of the couch.

“You’re very little,” he explained.

She blushed, “I’m sorry.”

His brow furrowed and he shook his head before pulling her back against him. Her arms went around his shoulders and one of his was on the small of her back, holding her to him and the other moved up her back until he was holding her neck.

She kissed the side of his lips and then his cheek and couldn’t help but nibble on his perfect jaw and then she was suddenly going forwards.

He fell onto his back on the couch and she fell on top of him. His hands immediately went to steady her, one on her upper back and the other on her…

“Sorry,” Robb grinned, removing his hand from her butt.

She laughed because it was very clear he wasn’t sorry in the slightest. He squeezed her tightly and she lowered her lips to his once more.

A groan started in his chest and made its way into her throat. She swallowed it, her leg slipping down around his and her body moved against his.

“Ella,” he panted.

“Sorry,” she grinned, though she wasn’t at all.

He chuckled and shifted them, so they were both lying on the couch, facing one another. Her leg was still draped on top of his and the rest of their bodies were intertwined.

“Thank you for calling me, by the way,” he told her conversationally, as though they weren’t wrapped up in one another. She looked into his eyes and he shook his head, “I couldn’t really think about anything else. I wanted to kiss you this morning, but I didn’t know if you want me to.”

“Are you still unsure?” she teased.

He chuckled, “No, no I’m uh, I mean if you _wanted_ to make it a little clearer-“ she pressed a kiss to his lips. It was meant to be quick but his arm tightened around her and she sunk against him. “That… clarifies things.”

“But-,” she started. Robb’s face fell and she shook her head, “No, no it’s just… Maybe let’s hold off on kissing at school. I really _wanted_ you to kiss me but it’s probably not for the best. The rumor mill already spends enough time on us as it is.”

“Really?” his brow furrowed.

Hers did too and she nodded, “You didn’t know that?” He shook his head, so she rolled her eyes, “There has been speculation about us since the first week of school.”

“But we didn’t know each other then,” he pointed out.

“Details,” she shrugged.

He chuckled and pressed his lips to hers. She kissed him back briefly and then pulled away.

“I should go help Gilly,” she noted.

His eyes sparkled with mischief, “I _think_ you’ve already done enough of that, wouldn’t you say Miss _What did one of you see the other naked?_ ”

She giggled, “Well in my defense I didn’t _know_ for sure, I just suspected.”

“You could have shared your suspicions with me,” he argued with a grin.

“I could have,” she agreed, and then pouted, swiping her nose against his, “But this was so much more fun.”

“Oh _no_ , uh uh,” he shook his head.

“What?” she asked innocently.

“This is not how it’s going to be,” he warned her, “You can’t just…,” his eyes fell to hers and then rolled into the back of his head when her fingers scratched into his hair.

“I can’t just what?” she asked against his jaw.

His arms wrapped more firmly around her and then she was on top of him and then just as suddenly next to him again but her back was against the back of the couch. Robb’s lips found hers and she kissed him back eagerly, delighting in the way his lips made every single thought fall right out of her usually overactive mind.

_“DINNER’S READY!_ ” she heard Gilly call from the kitchen.

Robb stopped kissing her and asked, “What do you think the chances are that they’ve forgotten we’re here?”

She was about to answer when they heard, “MOMMY! DADDY! DINNER!”

“Umm…,” she pretended to think about it, “Like low 70s?”

He chuckled and they got up, which was a little difficult because their limbs weren’t in any of the right places. Robb got himself disentangled and then helped her off the couch.

“Is it obvious?” she asked.

He wasn’t too bad, though his hair was a little askew. Robb cringed.

“It’s a little obvious,” he admitted, smoothing her hair. “Where did I put that thing?”

She looked around for it and then saw it on her wrist and she held it up. Robb’s mouth fell open, as though he couldn’t _believe_ how smooth he was, and she chuckled and pulled it up into a messy bun on top of her head.

She glanced at him, to see if it was better and he gave her a small smile and a shrug, “Gorgeous.” Her cheeks heated and he shook his head, “She blushes, I say an inarguable fact, and she blushes.”

She flattened his curls a bit and smoothed his shirt, grinning as Robb used the opportunity to pepper kisses along her temple.

“Don’t start,” she pleaded.

He chuckled and rubbed her back before turning her around. They exited his office and though Robb expected there to be a firing squad waiting for them he moved in front of her.

No one was standing there though, and she squeezed his arm and they headed into the kitchen.

“Where were you?” Cole asked.

“In Robb’s office,” she told him honestly.

“Probably checking out hiding spots for the next game of Hide-And-Seek,” Brynden suggested kindly.

“Oooooh I never hide in there!” Wes grinned.

She and Robb took their seats, at opposite ends of the table thankfully, and she set about cutting up Cole’s chicken, letting the conversation take up around her.

It took her a minute, longer than a minute, to settle back into herself. She didn’t really feel capable of joining the conversation, which was alright because it was going at a mile a minute. Robb was doing better than her, and whenever she felt his eyes on her it unraveled her all over again.

When dinner ended, Brynden retired to go read and the boys went up to Wes’ room and Robb convinced Gilly to leave him with a messy kitchen, telling her to go see Mr. Tarly immediately and make it clear that he didn’t have a problem with it.

While Robb walked her out, she started clearing things from the table and set herself up at the sink. The menial task felt nice, scraping and rinsing and placing in the dishwasher. Soap on this sponge on that.

“You don’t have to do that,” Robb told her as he came back into the kitchen.

“How many times are you going to tell me that?” she wondered with a smile.

“Every time you’re in this kitchen most likely,” he grinned.

She glanced at him, “You just want me to put things away, don’t you?”

He chuckled, “No, though you _are_ better at it.”

She smiled and left the water running so that he could take her place at the sink and then went into the pantry and pulled out different sized Tupperware containers. It was an odd sort of talent, knowing the exact right size of Tupperware for any leftover, and it was one that Robb did not possess.

“So, you never actually answered me,” she reminded him, and he glanced at her. “About Wes’ birthday.”

“Oh,” he smiled, “I’d love that. The four of us, maybe. On Friday.” He looked at her and said, “I’d invite you to join us Thursday but we just-…”

“You don’t have to explain,” she assured him, meaning it. He nodded at her and she smiled, “Thanks.”

He shook his head at her and she nodded because she knew what it meant. She brought the now empty serving dishes over to him and placed them by the sink.

Robb put his hand on top of hers and her eyes fell from his down to their interlaced fingers. To his fingers wrapped around hers. And then to one in particular.

“You…don’t wear yours,” he noted quietly, clearly having followed her gaze to his wedding ring.

“Yes, I do,” she promised and he looked over at her. She reached into her sweater and pulled out the delicate gold chain and showed him the ring that rested on it. “I always wear it.”

His eyes softened and he looked at it, “Can I ask why? There, I mean.”

She could have given him some line about it being closer to her heart that way, but she didn’t want to lie to him, so she admitted, “It got too difficult, people asking.”

He nodded and then smiled a sad smile and shook his head, “I tried to take mine off for a while. But it got too difficult, people not asking.”

“Yeah,” she agreed, because there was that too.

She walked around him and hopped up on the counter, picking up one of the dishes he’d washed and drying it.

“So, what do you have planned for the northern invasion?” she wondered gently, not wanting to further the conversation neither of them had intended to have if he didn’t want to.

His eyes crinkled at her and he took another one of the platters and started washing it.

“Lots,” he confirmed, “It’s a lot of work for them all to come down here this year so we’re trying to make it as festive as possible.”

She smiled, as she had when he’d first told her about the change of plans. It was so sweet, all of them piling down here because Brynden couldn’t make the trip up. She was sure he was frustrated they were all making such a fuss over him, but she was glad he wouldn’t be spending Thanksgiving alone.

“So, whose all coming?” she wondered, “Is Arya making the trip over?”

“Yeah,” his face lit up, “Haven’t seen her in _so_ long, so all the kids and Jon and Lya and my Dad.”

Dad. Not parents.

“You… never talk about your Mom,” she pointed out uselessly, he obviously knew that.

“She…died,” he told her, “When I was twenty-five.”

Her stomach churned, though deep down she’d know that.

“I’m sorry,” she told him helplessly, not wanting to press for details that he didn’t want to give.

“It was a stroke,” he told her, “The oddest thing, really. I had just visited the weekend before and we’d gone riding together. She was healthy as a… well anyway.”

He had lost two of the most important women, arguably the two most important women, in his life without any opportunity to say goodbye. They were both taken from him so _suddenly_ and so _randomly_. It was no wonder he was as protective of Gilly as he was.

“You…,” she tried to think of an appropriate question, “Were already living here?”

He nodded, “Yeah I offered to come home, you know um, Rickon is only seventeen now, so he was _young_ and Bran isn’t that much older… but my Dad wanted me to stay and help my Grandfather and Uncle Brynden. I decided to give it a year, see them through it.”

It didn’t take a genius to know that he’d never gone back.

“What happened?” she asked.

“I met Jeyne,” he told her, an apology in his eyes.

An unnecessary one.

She smiled gently and took the platter he offered her and wiped it dry.

“What about you? You’re not seeing your parents, right?” he asked. Then grimaced, “Sorry, that sounded really insensitive.”

She shook her head, “No, it didn’t, and no, I’m not. My mother can’t stand my brother Tommy’s wife, Margaery. Or her family. And, well my father passed away when I was in university.”

“Oh,” he said.

She wondered if he saw a symmetry in their loss. He, a wife and mother. She, a husband and father. She hoped he didn’t.

“It’s not the same,” she told him. He looked at her, “Your Mom and my father. He wasn’t… he wasn’t that sort of Dad.”

Robb nodded, “Then you’re right, it’s not the same. You lost him twice.”

“Why are you so nice?” she accused.

He turned off the water, and chided, “Always saying it like it’s a character flaw.”

She smiled and he took the dishtowel from her hands and wiped off his own and placed it on the counter beside her. Her legs opened to accommodate him standing in between them and she wrapped her arms around his back, pressing a kiss to his lips. He kissed her back deeply, her head tilting backwards and his arms wrapping around her tightly.

After a moment, Myrcella pulled away from him slightly so that she could look at him. His blue eyes were drinking her in, and she let hers wander over his lips, now red, and the freckles dusting the bridge of his nose, and the slope of his cheekbones and then back up to his eyes.

He took her face in his hands and told her, “I’m trying really hard not to get ahead of myself here. And you’re making it very, very difficult. Because I _like_ you. A lot.”

She smiled, “But I like you a lot too.”

He shook his head, and whispered, “ _Not helping,_ ” against her lips.


	16. Chapter 16

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Okay so I had toooootally not anticipated writing the first part of this chapter but then I got an idea and shared it and was convinced that I ought to... also I have no idea how this ch got so long. 
> 
> I hope you enjoy!

“So did Cole tell you why we have to wear pajamas?” Robb asked Wes as they drove over.

“No,” Wes told him, excitement in his voice, “He said it was a _sooprise!_ ”

Robb grinned as he looked at his son in the rearview mirror. He had turned five yesterday and Robb had what he felt was an appropriate reaction – bursting into tears while looking at baby photos.

In some ways it was unbelievable to him that his baby was five years old already, and in others he couldn’t fathom that he hadn’t always known him. He was the best friend a guy could ask for and the sweetest thing in his entire world and he was _five_.

Last night they’d had their traditional one on one birthday. A part of him had wondered if he should have told Ella that she could do her dinner last night, but they’d never invited Brynden or Theon or Gilly or anyone, and while he knew Wes wouldn’t have minded, being with him the night before, just the two of them, had felt important. He couldn’t place why exactly but it had.

Wes had asked a surprising amount about Jeyne, too. It went in waves with him, some weeks it felt like she was all they talked about, others he didn’t bring her up at all. His son had wanted to know about all the birthdays they’d spent together, even though he’d only had two (the day he was born, and his first) with her.

So, Robb had told him all about what a disaster his first birthday had been. How hard Jeyne had worked and how upset she was that her baby’s first birthday had been ruined. Wes had giggled the whole way through it – the series of events really had been so hilariously unfortunate – and confirmed that _Mommy tried her best_. Robb had smiled through it, fighting down the lump in his throat when he thought about how determined Jeyne had been that Wes’ second birthday would be better.

She’d never seen it though, and he had been in no shape to celebrate, being just about a month out from losing her and their baby. That first year it had just been him and Wes. He’d tried, getting a cake from a local bakery, but it had tasted too sweet, fake, compared to the homemade ones they were both used to. Selfishly he was glad that Wes didn’t remember, he had not been at his best then.

He’d made up for it on his third, the pair of them had gone to a hockey game and pizza and Wes had declared it the _best day ever_ , and it had been topped the next year when he’d taken him to Frozen on Ice, which had left Wes in a haze for _days_ afterwards.

This year, knowing that he had the dinner tonight and the birthday party tomorrow, and that their family would make a big deal of it, bringing another round of presents down with them when they came next week, he’d kept it simple. He’d grilled for the two of them and Gilly had graciously made them a cake. They’d ate and spent longer at the dinner table than usual and watched a movie, Wes falling asleep against him halfway through it, as though his son knew he needed a reminder that he was still his little boy.

“A _sooprise_ , hmm?” Robb asked as he turned down Ella’s street.

“I bet it’s gunna be good,” Wes reasoned.

“Yeah, honey, I think you’re probably right about that,” Robb agreed.

He and Ella had talked about it a bit. He also did not know why they had to wear pajamas or what they were having or what they were doing, she’d only promised not to go overboard and told him to bring his inner _kid_ along. Her and Cole would be giving Wes his present tonight – Ella had told him weeks ago that she’d bought Wes a projector like Cole had and that Cole had been the one to pick out the different slides they got for him.

Wes would love it though he imagined that his son would not think about their time at the planetarium every time he used it like he would. The first day they’d all spent together.

“LOOK A BALLOON!” Wes grinned.

Robb looked at the tree at the base of Ella’s drive and saw that there was in fact a single Toothless balloon wrapped around it.

“That Ella,” Robb shook his head.

“That Ella,” Wes confirmed with a giggle.

Robb grinned as he turned down the drive. When he parked behind Ella’s car, he opened the back door for Grey Wind, who had received his own little invitation, and before he could even walk around to help him out, Wes was opening the door to the back seat. He hopped out and Robb closed the door and Wes slipped his hand into his.

“Hi Daddy,” Wes greeted him.

“Oh, I didn’t know you were coming,” Robb grinned.

Grey Wind trotted along at their side, but as Ella opened the door he sprinted to her. She greeted him exuberantly, making Grey Wind all the more wild, and it gave Robb a moment to look at her without his son’s or her gaze on him.

He had to admit, when he’d heard the dress code was pajamas his mind had wandered a little. Having absolutely no idea what Ella slept in, it was up to him to fill in the blanks. Not that anyone was forcing him to or anything, but even still, he’d imagined her in just a t shirt, or in boxers and a tank top, definitely more than once he’d thought about her in a little nighty.

Had the _rational_ part of his mind worked though, he would have imagined her exactly as she was now. Her golden hair was scooped up in a high ponytail, and she wore a long sleeved pale blue silk pajama set and a pair of slippers.

It wasn’t quite the little black lacy thing he’d imagined her in the night before, but she looked beautiful and more importantly appropriate for a night in with their sons.

“ELLLLAAAA,” Wes greeted her, almost more intensely than Grey Wind.

Ella opened her arms to Wes who all but tackled her into the foyer. Robb followed him in and Ella smiled at him over Wes’ shoulder.

She’d always smiled at him, but it was different now. She smiled at him like they shared a wonderful secret, because they did. He knew that his answering smile mirrored hers.

“It smells _incredible_ in here,” he told her.

“YEAH!” Wes said.

“MOMMY THE BACON TIMER,” Cole called from the kitchen.

“Thank you, baby,” Ella called back and then waved them in and disappeared to go back to the kitchen.

“Did he just say -,” he started.

Wes looked at him and exulted, “BACON.”

Robb hurried to close the door and he brought the bag that had his and Wes’ slippers into the kitchen with them.

Cole was sitting on the counter as Ella pulled a sheet of bacon from the oven.

“Wes, Robb, look!” Cole greeted them.

Robb picked Wes up so they could both look at the bowl Cole was putting to. Robb couldn’t help but chuckle when he saw fruit balls of every color in it.

“She’s been working you hard, huh buddy?” he greeted him.

“I’m her Sue Chef,” Cole informed him proudly.

“Look at them!!” Wes pointed at the bowl.

Ever since their first dinner together, fruit balls had been a constant theme. It seemed they all agreed that fruit really did taste better in ball form, _science_ as Ella had explained, so he shouldn’t have been surprised her and Cole would do it for this.

He placed Wes on the counter and glanced around the kitchen. There was a stack of waffles already made and Ella was busy putting some sort of glazed bacon onto a platter.

“Breakfast for dinner?” he asked Ella.

She turned to look at him, that blush he loved rising on her cheeks, “I remembered it was his favorite so I thought… why not have a pajama party?”

Ella offered it casually, but her eyes were anything but. It was something he was still getting use to with her. He remembered telling her that she was _intimidatingly put together_ , and while he stood by that, the more time he spent with her the more he realized how inadequate she felt at times, for Cole. And in herself too. It didn’t make any sense, from the outside, but those things rarely did.

_I think for a really long time she felt like she had to be perfect to deserve to be loved._

He didn’t want her to feel like that, but he couldn’t stop himself from confirming, “Perfect,” because he knew he was a long way off from convincing her she didn’t have to be.

The way she beamed at him made his heart clench and she informed him, “Okay, so for the boys I have orange juice and I thought I might have a cheeky little mimosa, which you can have too, unless you’d prefer a Bloody Mary.”

“You have stuff for Bloody Mary’s?” he asked curiously.

She grinned and pointed to the fridge and he pulled out a small pitcher of red liquid.

“I wasn’t sure what your vodka of choice was, but it’s all out on the bar in the dining room,” she told him.

He couldn’t help but get a little closer to her and ask, “Trying to get me drunk?”

She blushed but teased, “We’re being _festive_.”

He chuckled and stroked her arm and then poured himself a glass and went into the dining room. To be honest, he was proud of the restraint she’d shown. All of the seats had party hats and party horns at them, and the table cloth had confetti strewn about, but otherwise it was very subdued.

She of course only had the good stuff and he poured a bit of vodka into his glass and then went back into the kitchen where she and the boys were conferencing.

“Okay,” she turned to him with a smile, “The only thing we have to think about now is what kind of eggs everyone wants.”

“Ooh Daddy make your eggs!” Wes suggested.

He had to admit he felt pretty proud that Wes suggested it. Though his son was always very sweet about anything he made, the majority of his meals were made by Gilly, who put the best chefs to shame, and Ella, who was talented in her own right.

“Your eggs?” Ella asked curiously.

He shrugged, “It’s just a scramble thing.”

“They are the _best eggs EVER_ ,” Wes informed them.

Ella’s smile was instantaneous and she turned to look at him, “Well… I’d hate to put you to work when you’re my guest but…”

“ROBB EGGS ROBB EGGS,” Cole started banging his fists on the counter.

“DADDY EGGS DADDY EGGS,” Wes continued.

Ella didn’t say anything, but she made a fist and started banging the counter too. He had a hard time resisting any one of them on his best day. There was no chance against the three of them.

“Alright alright alright,” he agreed.

“Mommy can I show Wes the games?” Cole asked.

“Of course, baby, are your hands clean?” Ella asked.

Cole held his out for her inspection and though Wes hadn’t touched any food he did the same. She smiled at them both and helped them off the counter and the two of them ran out of the room.

“What do you need for the _best eggs ever_?” she asked him with a sly smile.

“Don’t get your hopes up,” he ordered and then grinned, “But it _is_ a secret recipe so just the pan, please. I’ll get everything else.”

She giggled and crouched down to grab a saute pan and put it on the stove and then went to move around him to grab something.

He grabbed her by the waist and pulled her back against him, his hands delighting in the silk of her pajamas and her body underneath them.

“Hi,” he said in her ear.

“Hi,” she greeted him, nuzzling her temple against him.

“You’re wonderful,” he informed her.

“How much booze did you put in that thing?” she teased, leaning her head back against his chest.

He smirked and pressed his lips briefly, too briefly, to hers. Her jade eyes looked into his for a moment, her fingers brushing his cheek and he was loathe to let her go but he knew the boys could come back into the kitchen at any second.

It had been just over a week since their first kiss and they hadn’t talked yet about what they were doing or whether they should tell the boys or anything. They’d spent a lot of time together but very little alone time and most of that, admittedly, had been spent kissing.

He knew they would have to talk about it eventually. The idea of what it would mean for Wes and Cole had kept him up for hours, but for now they seemed to have an unspoken agreement not to let the boys know that anything had changed between them.

She brought a couple of things into the dining room after grabbing him a mixing bowl and he went into the fridge. Knowing she’d be back any second he grabbed out a bunch of things he didn’t need for the eggs along with the things that he did.

“Those… are some elaborate eggs…,” she informed as she came back into the kitchen and stood at his side at the counter.

He grinned and informed her, “It’s a misdirect. Can’t have you copycatting my recipe. It’s my only claim to fame. In fact, don’t even look at the counter.”

She giggled, and turned her back to the counter, her fingers going to his forearm. They started moving upwards when she cooed, “That’s alright, I’ll look at you instead.”

His cheeks heated and his smile hurt his face, “You’re such a flirt.” She shrugged and he pleaded, “Flirt with me more.”

She laughed, “I can’t just turn it on.” He fixed her with a look, and she smiled, “Okay I can but – _hello boys!_ ”

As he started making the eggs Ella kept the boys busy. Everything else got into the dining room and he heard her getting them settled. Without him seeing her do it, she had placed a platter beside the stove for the eggs and he deposited the steaming eggs onto it, turning off the stove.

When he brought the eggs into the dining room, Ella and the boys were already wearing their party hats. Robb put the eggs down on the table and Cole got up and went to his seat and grabbed his party hat.

Robb crouched down and Cole very carefully put his hat on him.

“I have a secret!” Cole informed him.

Wes and Ella were very used to that by now and Robb leaned towards him so that he could whisper in his ear.

“ _I have another loose tooth_ ,” Cole whispered excitedly.

Robb put his hands to cover either side of Cole’s face and Cole raised a little finger and wiggled one of his bottom teeth. It was only just loose, it’d be a while, but he knew how exciting it was.

“ _Soup soup soup,_ ” Robb intoned quietly.

Cole giggled and settled back into his seat, so Robb got into his. While they’d been gossiping, Ella had been piling Wes’ plate and was now working on Cole’s.

“This is gonna be _soo good_ ,” Wes’ wide eyes told the table.

He glanced at Ella who was smiling to herself as she put some bacon onto Cole’s plate. Robb grabbed the eggs and loaded the boys up and then Ella.

They all dug in and there were different sounds of appreciation from all of them.

“These. Are. The. Best. Eggs. EVER,” Cole informed him, scooping a bit.

He tried not to watch Ella take a bite, but it was hard not to. Her eyes turned to him as she chewed and then she smiled a closed mouth smile.

“These. Are. The. Best. Eggs. EVER,” she agreed.

He focused on the bacon, which clearly had some brown-sugar-goodness on it. Everyone was in agreement that every single thing on the table was delicious and the boys were talking all about tomorrow and how great it was going to be and how the _whooole_ class was coming.

“So why do you think we do breakfast for dinner but not dinner for breakfast?” Ella asked the boys as they ate. Cole looked at her first and she shrugged, “A little spaghetti and meatballs in the morning?” Wes turned to her and grinned and she suggested, “Some pot roast to start the day?”

The boys giggled but Wes shook his head, his nose scrunching in concentration, “I don’t know. Daddy?”

They all turned to look at him and he had to say something, but the truth was, he had no idea why breakfast for dinner was socially acceptable and yet he was called a barbarian for eating noodles out of a takeout container for breakfast.

So, he told them the only answer that all of them would accept without question, “Science.”

This, as he suspected it would, made very good sense to all of them and they all continued their dinner. The boys made use of the party horns and only Grey Wind’s barking could convince them that _maybe_ it was enough.

“Alright,” Ella said when everyone was finishing up, “I think _present, games, cake,_ what do you think, sweetheart?”

“YEAH!” Wes agreed, his smile too large for his face.

“Why don’t you go wash your hands, honey?” he suggested.

Wes got up from the table and Cole went with him, the pair of them running through the house.

“While I have you alone,” Robb said, and Ella’s instantaneous blush was like a bolt of lightning in his body. He tried to stop his smile, but he couldn’t, “Sorry no I mean… how are you guys getting to the airport on Tuesday?”

Though Wes’ birthday always fell around Thanksgiving, for some reason he was having a hard time wrapping his head around the idea that it was already here. Though he’d been doing plenty of shopping for it, it still felt strange not to have his and Wes’ tickets booked for their trip up North.

“Oh,” Ella blushed deeper and then shrugged, “I’ll just drive and then park there.”

“Those prices are insane,” he pointed out. She glanced around their surroundings and he rolled his eyes, “Just because you _can_ pay for something doesn’t mean it’s worth it.”

“Please tell me more, oh wise one,” she teased.

He chuckled, “Okay fine I’m mansplaining, but seriously it’s robbery. How about I drive you?”

She shook her head, “No you don’t have to do that. If anything, we can take a car.”

“Can I?” he asked. Her gaze fell to him and he admitted, “People drive like idiots around the holidays.”

She nodded, “Okay. If it’s not too much trouble.”

“It’s no trouble,” he promised.

The boys ran back in and Wes settled back at his seat. Robb got up and took his plate away from him, knowing that the projector could end up in a puddle of maple syrup if they weren’t careful.

Ella and Cole each grabbed a perfectly wrapped package and brought it over to him.

“TWO!?” Wes asked.

“Two?” Robb repeated.

Ella glanced at him briefly and then at Cole, her fingers stroking through her son’s hair, “Want to tell them the rule, baby?”

“One bought and one homemade,” Cole told them and then looked at him, “It’s the birthday rule.”

“Oh,” he nodded solemnly, “Well if it’s the rule.”

Wes grinned and took the first package when Cole practically shoved it into his hands. His son encouraged Ella’s to help him with the wrapping paper and he nearly screamed in excitement when the box was revealed.

“DADDY LOOK!” Wes held it up, “WE CAN LOOK AT SPACE.”

“That is _so_ cool,” he agreed, looking at the different slides they’d chosen, “These slides are _awesome_.”

“I picked them!” Cole told him.

“You did such a good job, buddy,” he promised.

Before he could tell him to, Wes handed him the box and got up and hugged Cole first, thanking him, and then went over to Ella and hugged and thanked her.

She handed him the second gift and instead of moving back to his chair he placed it on her lap and unwrapped it, lifting the box.

“It’s your project!” Wes all but gasped.

Ella smiled down at him, helping him take it out. It was a navy blue, hand-knit blanket with some sort of patterned border. He stepped closer and saw that it was stars and moons.

“You made this?” he asked.

The _for him_ was unspoken, he was afraid he wouldn’t be able to get it out.

She nodded, averting his gaze and smiling as Wes wrapped it around his body and head, “He liked Cole’s so much.”

Wes, still bundled, did his best to climb into her lap and she hoisted him up, “I love you, Ella.”

He said it as though it was nothing. As though it was obvious. Like he was just saying it to Gilly or Sansa, someone he couldn’t ever remember not loving.

His head was tucked into her neck so Wes couldn’t see her face, but Robb could. The absolute, unadulterated, joy that rested there. A tear fell out of her eye and Robb wanted to brush it from her cheek, but he just stood there watching them helplessly.

“I love you too, sweetheart, Happy Birthday,” she hugged his son close.

He liked that she didn’t look at him. That it wasn’t about him. She was the sort of person who would be kind to any child of whoever she was dating, as a Mom it would be important to her, he knew that. He also knew that her love for Wes had absolutely nothing to do with him, and it was so much more meaningful because of it.

Cole’s arm wrapped around his leg and he stroked his hair, looking down at him and smiling. He’d tell him someday, how much he loved him, but it seemed wrong to do it now. Cheap, almost, and he didn’t want anyone to think he was just saying it.

Cole seemed like he knew though, like he could feel it, which was enough.

Once more _thank yous_ had been doled out, he and Ella cleared the table as the boys went into the living room to choose a game. He knew from experience that they had a whole cupboard full of them, everything from Candyland to Risk and there was no predicting what the boys would choose. 

When they’d run out of the room, Robb closed the distance between him and Ella and picked her up, pressing a kiss to her lips.

She kissed him back, her fingers carding into his hair and sighing into his mouth, her body pressing deliciously against his. It felt like maybe she’d been wanting to do that all night too and it made him kiss her more deeply.

“Robb,” she murmured against his lips, he kept kissing her and she giggled, “Robb.”

“Sorry,” he grinned, though he wasn’t.

Her eyes were hazy, and he set her back down on the floor. He went to move away from her, but she gripped his arm, steadying herself and then shaking her head and laughing at herself.

“You,” she pointed at him. He raised his eyebrows at her and she shook her head, “Wow. Okay. Warn a girl next time.”

“Where’s the fun in that?” he wondered.

She laughed, looking at him once more and then they kept clearing the table. When they were done with that they went into the living room.

“So, what game are we playing, hmm?” Ella asked the boys.

Cole and Wes giggled and then proffered a box, “TWISTER!”

“Twister?” he asked them and then he looked at Ella, “Twister???”

She blushed and brushed the air, “It was way at the bottom of the stack.”

He chuckled and they got it all set up. They suggested the boys just play and he and Ella spin, but that was not met with enthusiasm, so he and Ella joined them at the mat as well.

Robb put himself as far away from her as possible. It wasn’t far enough. He had remembered Twister being much larger than this, but a few spins and he and Ella would be wrapped around each other.

Not that he would mind that, if their sons weren’t in the room. In fact, he made a mental note to remember that she had this game. For… game nights in the future.

The first two games ended rather quickly, with Cole and Wes falling to the floor in a fit of giggles. On the third though, the boys had a quiet determination about them.

His height was an advantage but his age and lack of flexibility was not, whereas Ella was small but very flexible. Very. Flexible.

Cole and Wes seemed to keep getting the same spins, but poor Ella had one leg bent, another stretched out entirely and her arms behind her. At first he was hovering over her, until his son spun something that thankfully pulled him away so that she wasn’t sprawled out directly underneath him, the neckline of her pajamas falling ever so slightly to the side.

Apparently though he was not the only one who found her irresistible, because just when she was about to be able to move, Grey Wind got up and walked right up to her.

“Grey Wind,” Robb warned.

“Grey Wind,” Ella giggled.

His dog ignored them both and with one paw, shoved Ella by the chest until she fell to the floor laughing. That was nothing compared to the squeals that erupted from her when Grey Wind took the opportunity of her prostrate form to lie down on top of her, licking her face and neck.

“Grey Wind,” he chuckled, clapping his hands.

“Grey Winddddd,” Wes chided, trying to tug him off.

Ella shrieked with laughter as Grey Wind put his paw on her face to hold her steady so that he could lick her more.

It was difficult to rid the laughter from his voice in order to give an appropriate order but when he finally did, Grey Wind acquiesced with a sigh and then got off of her.

Ella lay there stunned and Cole and Wes pulled her arms up so that she could be seated.

“I have fur in my mouth,” Ella let them all know.

“Blech,” Cole winced.

“Sorry, he just _really_ doesn’t like to be left out of games,” Robb told her.

Ella laughed and accepted the hand he offered her so he pulled her up.

She gestured to her face and then her whole body, grinning, “I’m just going to go get cleaned up.”

He nodded and she looked up at him with pink cheeks. Her fingers traced his bicep lightly as she walked away and he spun again for the boys.

As he did though he thought about those fingers. They had been so purposeful. Like a sign.

Maybe Twister had been as painful for her as it was for him.

“Here Wes,” he handed his son the spinner, “You spin, I’ll be right back.”

“Okay Daddy,” Wes said and then he spun and said, “Cole, left hand yellow… no your _left_ hand… that’s your foot.”

Robb chuckled as he went down the hall to the powder room. The door was closed and he heard the water running and he turned the knob and walked in.

Ella had her eyes closed and was scrubbing her face with a towel and he closed the door behind him.

He reached out to grab her waist and she yelped.

“Sorrysorrysorryit’sjustme,” he told her.

“You scared the bajeezus out of me,” she laughed.

“Oh,” he said stupidly. She looked at him, “I thought that was a sign.”

“A sign not to sneak up on women in bathrooms?” she teased.

He chuckled, “No, when you touched my arm. I thought it was a signal.”

“ _Oh_ ,” she nodded and then smiled, “That’s good, we should use that. But no, that was just a sign that I can’t stop touching you.”

“Oh,” he realized, feeling stupid, and then realized what she’d just said, “Oh.”

She turned off the water and turned around, wrapping her arms around his neck, “So um… what did you think would happen in here?”

“Nothing much,” he shook his head, leaning down so he could brush his lips against hers, “Just this.”

“Just that?” she asked softly, her soft lips taking his bottom one in between them.

He nodded against her, his arms wrapping around her and proving himself to be a liar when he kissed her more firmly. His hands went underneath her pajama top, feeling the soft skin of her waist and her mouth opened to him.

She had turned him, once again, into a horny teenager. He thought about kissing her all the time, and the sneaking around didn’t help. Every time he was in the same vicinity as her he was looking for places to drag her into so that he could kiss her, even just for a second.

One of her hands left him and she reached behind him and turned the lock of the bathroom door. He smiled against her mouth and turned them around, pressing her against the door.

“Robb,” she whimpered.

He wasn’t sure what she wanted but he knew what he wanted and he bent down and picked her up by the backs of her thighs, wrapping them around his waist. The way her tongue glided against his and the way her thighs clenched him told him he’d chosen perfectly and he held her with one hand, his other going to her throat, tilting her head back gently and kissing her neck.

Her hands gripped him, and her body moved against his.

“Ella,” he whimpered.

“One more minute,” she pleaded. “And then we can go play Candyland.”

He chuckled against her neck, “Whatever you want.”

“What _ever_ I want?” she asked.

For a brief moment he wondered if she was going to suggest a quickie. It would be wrong, terrible, and wrong, and he would say no. Probably. Maybe. He’d do his best.

Instead, though she pulled away and asked, “Like the recipe for those eggs?”

He chuckled as blood returned to his brain and walked her over to the sink and set her down on it, “You liked those, huh?” She nodded and he lamented, “Sorry, El, those are a _secret_ recipe.” Her eyes went wide and he grinned at her, tucking some escaped hair behind her ear, “So how about you just call me anytime you get a craving for them?”

“Day or night?” she smiled.

His eyes wandered over her kiss-stained lips and the slope of her nose and her cheeks and back to those cloudy jade eyes.

And then he thought about her knitting a blanket for Wes, and the way she smiled when she saw him, and the way the coo of her voice could make his heart race.

“Yeah, Ella,” he agreed, “Day or night, you call and I’ll be there.”

***

“Did you grab your bunny?” she asked Cole as she double checked that she had their tickets and her identification and all of her cards and her keys and all the rest.

“Whooooops,” Cole said, sprinting up the stairs.

It was entirely unsurprising that her five-year-old son had forgotten the one thing he was in charge of remembering. Trystane had been that way too. He used to like to say _but I have you, so I have everything I need_ and would only grin when she’d point out that the airport might feel differently if they showed up without their passports.

She had absolutely enabled Trystane’s forgetfulness. Her type-A personality made her constantly over organized, which gave him full freedom to be disorganized. At the time she brushed it aside, because he never forgot the important things. He never forgot to pick her up her favorite soup when she was sick, or to call when he said he would, he never forgot a birthday or anniversary, or to tell her how beautiful she was or how happy she made him. He even remembered things like her Mother’s birthday and Gendry’s favorite whiskey.

It was just _things_ he couldn’t keep track of.

So she’d never made it a big deal then, and now, seeing it in Cole, she couldn’t help but be nostalgic for the days when Trystane would say _oh come on, baby, you keep hold of my mind and I’ll keep hold of your heart._

She’d gotten the better end of that deal by a mile.

More and more lately, her thoughts had been turning to Trystane. For years, it seemed, she’d been holding them back, feeling like she couldn’t handle them. A part of it, she knew, was therapy. Dr. Dayne had given her tools to open the door a little bit without letting everything spill out.

Robb though, was more responsible still. He was opening her heart without her permission, and it was no surprise that Trystane was still there, holding onto it tightly.

It was obvious to her that she was being disloyal to one or both of them. Every time she lost track of time thinking of Robb, it would be a memory of Trystane that jogged her out of it, and anytime she allowed her mind to wander to Trystane, to think about his laughter or his eyes, a pair of blue ones would appear shortly after.

She couldn’t help but wonder if Robb was dealing with the same. If he felt guilty when he thought of her or Jeyne. She hoped he didn’t. Jeyne was his wife, and the love of his life, and she hoped that he felt comfortable thinking of her and missing her, without worrying that it was somehow a slight to her.

Dr. Dayne would point out that she was extending more generosity towards Robb than herself, and that was true, but it was easier to do.

“GOT BUNNY,” Cole assured her, wielding it over his head as he ran down the stairs.

She laughed, “Did you think I would leave without you?”

“YEP,” he teased, jumping against her.

She looked out the window and saw Robb coming down the front drive, so she opened the door and waved before going back in to grab their things. Or to start to anyway.

Packing light was difficult with a child at the best of circumstances. As was packing for Highgarden. The two things combined made it impossible.

Cole would probably wear about five different things every day, from his pjs to his bathing suit to needing a sweatshirt in the shade but shorts in the sun and then putting on something _clean_ and _appropriate_ for dinner. She would too, though her dinner appropriate would be more formal than his, and there were all the shoes and the other nonsense that went with it.

The Tyrells did things differently, more similarly to the Lannisters, though both would be offended by the comparison, so she knew the rules. Even still, they exhausted her and she hadn’t even gotten there yet.

“Hello travelers!” Robb greeted them, getting out of his car.

He was still dressed in his suit from work, he’d left early to come get them, and her stomach flip-flopped at the sight of him.

“Robb!” Cole gave her a moment to recover, bounding towards him and jumping.

Her heart didn’t even seize when he did that anymore, because Robb was always right there, arms extended. Sometimes it felt like Robb could be clean across the yard and he’d still be right there, arms ready, before Cole could hit the ground.

“Do you think you have enough?” Robb grinned at her.

She glanced at him and the little pile of things assembled and blushed, “Oh there’s more inside.”

He chuckled, “Of course there is. Don’t worry, I already cleaned out my trunk in anticipation of Sansa’s arrival. She asked me the other day if she should bring down a food processor.”

She laughed, and then realized, “I should have offered her to use my kitchen if she needs more space. The fridge is totally cleaned out. And I _think_ I’ll have all the stuff she needs.”

Robb looked at her for a moment and then shook his head, “I dare not tell her that or by the time you come back I’ll have doubled in size… but… thank you. I’ll keep that in mind.”

“For calamities?” she suggested.

Half a surprised grin appeared on the left side of his face and his eyes wandered over hers and nodded, “Yeah, for calamities.” He then looked around, “Wes’ car seat is in the back already, do you just want to put yours in the trunk so we don’t have to bother with it?”

She nodded at the sense of that and they started bringing everything towards the car. Unsurprisingly, Robb handled the heavy lifting and she dealt with the organizing.

Cole was in charge of conversation.

He wanted to know everything that Robb and Wes were going to do while they were gone, who they were going to do it with, and whether or not they would enjoy it more if he was there. Robb indulged him as they got everything settled and as they headed towards the airport.

“Cole, baby,” she nudged gently when Robb was pulling onto the highway, “We’re getting back on Sunday. It will be fine.”

“Don’t discount our pain,” Robb chided teasingly, then promised, “I’m going to write you every day, Cole.”

Cole’s giggle drowned out her own and she raised her hand to stroke Robb’s arm but caught sight of Cole in the back and dropped it. Her son likely wouldn’t think anything of it. It wasn’t like she and Robb didn’t touch, and both of them were so affectionate with him and Wes that he likely wouldn’t even notice. But if he did she didn’t have an answer prepared, so she didn’t want to tempt fate.

Robb asked them all about what they had planned for Highgarden and she admitted that all she knew was that she was helping cook tomorrow and Wednesday mornings and that there was a formal dinner each night and otherwise had no idea.

Marg always showed them a good time, and with Gendry there she knew that Cole would be well entertained while she was being helpful, but she had learned long ago that when visiting the Tyrells it was best not to ask too many questions.

If they told you about an evening they had planned, you’d choose an outfit. But when you arrived they would whisk you off to their showroom and show you something that they thought would look just _divine_ on you, and then they’d style you how they wanted and your lame old outfit (which had been gifted to you by them the year before) would stay in the closet where they believed it belonged.

Robb pulled up to the entrance to their airline and she wasn’t ready to say goodbye. She didn’t mind traveling, in fact, Cole was a great travel buddy, but everything with Robb was so easy, and though she knew the next few days would be enjoyable, they wouldn’t necessarily be easy.

“Cole why don’t you stay in the car while your Mom and I get everything out, alright? People are _caraaaazy_ here,” Robb suggested.

“Okay,” Cole agreed, swinging his legs.

She and Robb got out of the car and he opened the trunk. Myrcella turned to someone at the desk.

“Are we able to check in and leave our bags here?” she asked.

“Yes, Ma’am,” one of the attendants answered.

“Great,” she smiled, reaching in her bag and handing him their tickets and her license, “I’m just going to help grab the rest of our things.”

She went to help Robb, but he had nearly gotten everything out of the trunk.

“You’re good,” she told him.

“Let’s just say I have experience,” he grinned, and then look at her quickly, “Sansa.”

“And Jeyne?” she asked as gently as she was able.

He let out a deep breath and nodded and she rubbed his arm, wanting to make him feel better for admitting that.

The attendants helped them bring the bags over – the wonders of two first class tickets.

“And do you have your license, Mr. Martell?” the one she’d handed hers to asked Robb.

She felt herself go numb for a moment and though she was sure she hadn’t moved, Robb’s hands grasped her arms holding her steady.

“I’m not traveling today,” he told them, “Cole Martell is her son, he’s only five so he doesn’t have an ID, can you please finish checking them in while we get him?”

The attendant nodded and walked away and Robb pulled her towards the car.

“Take a minute,” he told her, rubbing her back, “You’ve got plenty of time, alright?”

She nodded, “I’m sorry, it’s so silly.” Then looked up at him, “I’m sorry, that must have been so awkward for you.”

“No, no,” he shook his head, and his voice lightened when he said, “I’m just honored they think I’m good enough for you.”

Her smile surprised her, and it was clear it surprised him too from the way his appeared on his face.

She realized then that the feeling had returned in her fingers and the shaking had stopped. It never went away that quickly.

“Thank you,” she said to him, “For driving us and… well you know. Everything.”

“You’re welcome,” he told her, squeezing her waist gently before opening the door for Cole.

“Ready to fly, baby?” she asked.

Cole looked at Robb as he unbuckled, “Tell Lya I say hi, and Sansa, and Jon, and tell Wes that I’m going to bring him back something _cool_. Oh and tell Brynden –“ Cole looked at her, “I can’t remember what I had to tell Brynden.”

“Well,” Robb said, grabbing him out of his seat and settling him on his hip, “If you do, your Mom can just text me and I’ll tell him for you.”

“Okay, cool,” Cole agreed. He placed his hands on Robb’s shoulders and tilted his head to the side and asked, “Are you gonna miss me?”

Robb grinned at him, “Yeah, buddy, I am going to miss you something _awful_. But you have to go have _sooo_ much fun and then you can tell me all about it.”

“Guys night!” Cole grinned.

“ _Rude_ ,” Myrcella coughed.

Robb grinned at her and Cole giggled and then wrapped his arms around Robb’s neck and hugged him. Her heart clenched as Robb hugged him in return, rubbing his back and pressing a kiss to his curls.

Robb set Cole down and then her son looked up at her, “Manners, Mommy. You have to say goodbye too.”

Her jaw dropped and she looked at Robb whose grin was threatening to overtake his face.

Robb pulled her into his arms, and she couldn’t help but nuzzle against his chest briefly as she hugged him goodbye. Too soon though, it was over, and she fought the urge to ask him whether he’d miss her or not the way Cole had.

They thanked him again and waved and then went and collected their tickets and her license from the attendant. She and Cole walked into the airport hand in hand and headed towards the security line. Trystane had gotten the two of them on a ten year pre-check thing so she headed towards the much shorter, friendlier line.

“Ella! Cole!” she heard as they were nearing it.

“Robb!!” Cole called back as they turned around.

Robb ran over to them and proffered Cole’s little grey bunny.

“Can’t forget this, can you buddy?” Robb asked him.

“Oh no sorry Bunny!” Cole lamented, taking the stuffed animal from Robb and holding it tight, “Thanks Robb.”

Robb smiled at him and then glanced at her and she informed him, “You’re my hero. In case that wasn’t painfully obvious.”

“Yeah well,” he grinned, “Fair’s fair. You’re mine.”

She wanted to kiss him so badly. In fact, she couldn’t remember the last time she’d wanted to kiss someone as badly as she did in that moment.

So, she did. Not on the lips, but she stood up and pressed an all too brief kiss on his cheek. It was long enough for his hand to rub her back gently, and for her to want it to go on and on.

“Go on,” he murmured against her, “So you can get back.”

She looked up at him, and delighted in the way his pupils widened as he looked down at her. Giving him what she’d been told was a dazzling grin, she took Cole by the hand and headed towards security. It took all of her strength not to turn around and check if he had watched them go.

Even the lightened security line took them a while to get through, but they still had time to get Cole something to eat before they started boarding. She looked in her bag and realized she’d only brought Cole’s sweatshirt for the flight, and had forgotten her sweater. For once she was relieved Robb wasn’t around, he’d have given her grief about it. Though, he’d also give her his own sweater right off his back.

The flight attendants in First Class treated Cole like a little prince, and she made sure he was being polite right back. He was doing more than that though, the little flirt, making them laugh and _ooh_ and _ahh_ over his manners.

She smiled at them politely and reached in her bag to turn off her phone. Before she did she saw she had a text from Robb.

_I’m going to miss you too, in case that wasn’t painfully obvious. Have a safe flight, text me when you land if you remember. x_

Cole turned and looked at her and must have seen her smiling because he smiled back, “What Mommy?”

“Just Robb being Robb,” she told him.

“Robb being Robb,” Cole repeated, leaning against her arm.

The flight was easy, as usual. It was only a few hours from Riverrun to Highgarden, and Cole fell asleep about an hour in. She’d fought sleep, knowing that if she did she would never fall back asleep when they got to Tommy and Marg’s house, and had ended up watching a silly romantic comedy that she’d never gotten around to seeing. She’d laughed like a fool and her heart had thudded when the leads got together and by the time the credits started the pilot was telling them to prepare for landing.

When she felt them touch the ground, she nudged Cole awake and he nuzzled against her arm, trying to prolong his sleep.

She rubbed his back, “Keep your eyes closed, baby.”

He did just that and fell back asleep, so when they opened the plane door, she unbuckled him and picked him and carried him off, stuffing his bunny in her bag. She tried to get her phone, because she couldn’t remember who was picking them up – not that she wouldn’t recognize them, but she couldn’t reach it without jostling Cole too much.

She walked through the airport and went down the escalator to the baggage claim. It would still be a few minutes until their flight’s bags were loaded, and she looked around, searching out Gendry’s enormous form or Tommy’s sandy blonde hair.

Not seeing either of them she walked over to a seat and sat down, placing her bag beside her so she could reach for her phone.

“It should be a crime to look this good after a flight,” a deep voice told her as she searched for it.

She fought the urge to sigh. She knew it took a lot of courage to hit on someone, but it also took a stunning lack of awareness to hit on a mother holding her sleeping child after a flight.

Myrcella looked up to tell them as politely as she was able to leave her alone, but she realized quickly that she couldn’t. She looked into a pair of blue eyes.

“Willas?” she asked, forcing a smile to her face, “What are you doing here?”

“I was coming back on business,” Willas told her with a smile, “So I convinced Margy to let me drive you over.”

“Oh,” she nodded, “That was smart… and um, kind of you. I’m sorry though, we’ll be waiting for a while for these bags and we have _a lot_ of them. Don’t you have a convertible?”

“Don’t worry,” he held out his hand, “I brought the SUV. I was forewarned.”

So, this was a plan, then. He only had an overnight bag with him, but clearly Marg had known about this and said nothing. She wondered if Tommy did too, probably. Though she doubted Gendry did.

Her stomach clenched uncomfortably but she reminded herself that Willas was Tommy’s brother-in-law and a genuinely nice person. Which actually made this harder.

That was a problem for another day though so she gave him a light smile, fighting the desire to say _that makes one of us_ , and instead said, “If you were really forewarned you would have brought a forklift.”

He let out a light laugh and said, “Why don’t I go get the car and pull it around?”

“Great idea,” she agreed.

He gave her a smile and shook his head, “You really do look great, Myrcella. I’ll just be a minute.”

She gave him a close-lipped smile and nodded at him and he waved at her and walked away. The light started blinking, alerting them that the bags would start coming down and she reached into her bag and finally located her phone and turned it on.

The texts started coming in fast and furious.

Margaery: _Suuuuurprise! See you soon, baby. Xx_

Tommy: _Text me when you land. Sorry for the cloak and dagger, you know how Marg gets._

Gendry: _I was NOT a part of this._

Gendry: _Marg didn’t tell me until AFTER I’d had too many beers to be able to drive._

Gendry: _I thought Tommy and I were coming to get you together._

Gendry: _Sorry]._

Myrcella sighed and texted Tommy to let him know that she arrived and Gendry to tell him it was alright and to Marg she simply sent their favorite eye-roll gif, knowing her sister-in-law would know _exactly_ how she felt about what she did.

As she waited for the first of their bags to come down the conveyor belt she opened up the text from Robb once again, and let the calm wash over her. He always made everything so much easier, which was why his was the only text that she didn’t have to think about how to respond to.

_Just waiting for our cargo. Thank you again. And if it wasn’t painfully obvious – I’m going to miss you, too… (already do actually) xo_

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I'd love to hear what you think! 
> 
> Oh and ps if anyone thinks Grey Wind's antics are unrealistic, the whole twister scenario was envisioned after I played it with my niece yesterday and my dog did that and worse (including lying down in the middle of the mat and licking me from chin to forehead every time I had to move!)


	17. Chapter 17

If nothing else, the weather in Highgarden was always perfect. Last night, after they’d arrived and unloaded, it had started to rain. It had rained steadily until about 3 or 4 o’clock in the morning, so that by the time the sun rose there was nothing more than a dew on the roses.

When the sun rose it settled into a cloudless sky. In the morning it had been a sweet, 72 degrees. Perfect for those who wanted to take runs or walks or bike rides outside. It rose steadily in the morning, while she and Margaery were cooking, and by the time they were ready to eat lunch outside with everyone it was a stubborn 81 degrees where it would remain for the rest of the afternoon.

She and Marg were a great team in the kitchen, they always had been. Neither got in the other’s way, but they were always there, clearing a place to put down something hot, or to take something out of the oven for the other when they were occupied.

They talked, while they cooked, but not about anything important. Books they hadn’t gotten around to reading yet, and recipes the other had sent. Music was always playing, today it had been indie rock from when she was in high school, and Tommy and Gendry flitted in and out with the kids.

She should have used it as an opportunity to tell Marg about Robb. Her sister-in-law knew about him, who he was, but not _what_ he was to her. In truth, she didn’t know what he was to her either. They were in a bit of a no-man’s-land, and she didn’t want to rush them out of the beginning of something by talking about it too much. Even still, the eyes Marg had given her the night before when Willas had poured her a glass of wine, had made guilt churn in her stomach.

Willas was just as she remembered him. She rarely thought of him, except with a sort of dull anxiety, knowing that Margaery and Olenna and Loras, even Renly and Tommy to an extent, would all very much like to see them together. When she got past that, though, there was absolutely nothing wrong with him. Even that wasn’t fair. He was one of The Reach’s most eligible bachelors, Mace Tyrell’s heir, he’d been modeling for his family’s company since high school. He was polite, inquisitive, and she knew that if she bothered to get to know him better he likely wasn’t as dull as she found him to be. Tommy counted him amongst his best friends, which spoke in his favor, and Lenny adored her Uncle Willas, who was very sweet with her.

He had been an absolute gentleman last night, inquiring about her flight and health and all the rest. Cole had been awake but silent in the back, having woken as soon as Willas opened the door to the backseat so that she could set up his car seat. It was hard not to compare the situation to what it would have been with Robb, which wasn’t fair. Robb was a _Dad_ who had a relationship with Cole. Even still, as Cole stood at her side as she put in the car seat, she thought about all the times that her son had fallen or stayed asleep comfortably in Robb’s arms, or while he was driving, or in his presence in general.

Cole never felt the need to watch her with Robb.

It was strange, in a way, considering she was at a much greater risk with Robb than she’d ever been or would be with Willas. Yet her son had deemed them both safe in his company from the start.

She didn’t think Cole was _afraid_ of Willas, only wary, like even at five he understood that even though his intentions were honorable they were unwanted all the same.

Gendry, less subtle than his nephew, had taken over when they’d gotten to the house. His guilt was clearly in over-drive, which was silly because everyone knew who the culprit was, but had hovered close to her, lest Margaery think of shoving her and Willas into a broom closet. He’d brought in the lion’s share of her things and carried Cole up to his room and tucked him in, convincing him to get a good night’s sleep because they had _so_ much to do the next day.

When she had gotten her things settled too, he’d escorted her downstairs, and though neither of them were surprised to see Willas standing in the kitchen, holding a glass of wine, she, and she imagined everyone else, hadn’t missed the glare Gendry had sent Margaery’s way.

Margaery had merely rolled her eyes as Willas grinned at her and asked _red or white, and then we can get more specific_ , as Gendry stubbornly drank a beer. Tommy had stolen her from Gendry, and she supposed Willas and Margaery too, and brought her outside for some fresh air.

She never missed Tommy more than when she first saw him. It was such a strange sensation, the bittersweetness of being back with her little brother. They spoke regularly enough throughout the year, so it wasn’t like with Gendry whose calls she would answer no matter what because they could be so infrequent. When she was with him though it was hard to imagine that she went days without speaking to him.

He told her all about work and how he and Marg had started trying for another baby. A better son than she was a daughter, he caught her up on her mother’s affairs and whom she was currently speaking to and not. He was the best of them, the Lannisters. Loyal to their grandfather, good to their uncles. He even spoke to Joffrey more than the rest of them, always leaving the door slightly open whereas she had locked it firmly and then barricaded it still.

Not for the first time, as they walked in the gardens behind his home, she had wondered why Tommy had always been outshone. Joffrey, the eldest and her mother’s favorite, had always eclipsed his younger brother in the attention he received. She, too, had been unfairly preferred by her grandfather and her Uncle Jaime, though she did nearly nothing these days to earn it. Yet walking with him she also couldn’t help but wonder if he wasn’t just the luckiest of all of them. If the sort of tacit affection and occasional indifference the elder generations of her family had towards him hadn’t just allowed him to remain good and pure. In holding him at arm’s length, they’d allowed him to escape their clutches.

It had been an early night, but even still, after the flight and waking early to a dawn chorus, and cooking in the morning and the half glass of wine she’d had at lunch, she felt her eyelids droop as she lay by the pool.

She was on a lounge chair with Lenny, the pair of them turned towards one another, her sweet little niece adorable in her ruffled bathing suit.

“What should we do?” Lenny asked her.

“Whatever you want,” she told her honestly, though her throat was thick with sleep.

“I want to be with you allllllll afternoon,” Lenny informed her.

Myrcella smiled and kissed her forehead, “That sounds like a marvelous idea.”

“You have to go down for your nap in a few minutes, darling,” Marg informed her daughter from the lounge chair next to her.

Lenny’s face fell, the way Myrcella knew Cole’s would in spite of his need for one, so she smiled, “Hmmm well _maybe_ we could take a nap in my big bed.”

Lenny grinned, “SLEEPOVER.”

She and Marg laughed and she tilted her face towards the sun. Though she loved the Riverlands, the weather really couldn’t compete. People brought raincoats to the beach there.

“So, are we just doing something simple for dinner?” Myrcella asked.

“Sure,” Marg said in a tone that implied that was absolutely not happening, “But it will just be us. And Uncle Willas.”

Myrcella’s stomach churned again but Lenny exulted, “Uncle Willas!” Then informed her, “He brings me flowers.”

Myrcella smiled, “How gallant.”

“He really is,” Marg mused.

She was about to fix Margaery with a look when the gallant in question stepped onto the pool deck.

“UN-UN-UNCLE WILLAS,” Lenny scrambled out of her arms and over to him.

“There she is!” Willas grinned, picking Lenny up and throwing her into the air.

It was an undeniably sweet scene, and Myrcella used the distraction of it to cover her thighs with the towel that had been resting at her feet.

Margaery noticed and pursed her lips. Though Margaery had given birth even more recently than she had, she had never seemed to experience any changes in her body. Though she was back to her _pre-Cole_ weight, things didn’t seem to be exactly where they used to and it was one thing to be in a bathing suit in front of her sister-in-law and niece and quite another in front of a man she hardly knew. Particularly when his vantage point was an unflattering view of her thighs.

She knew there was a disconnect there. It wasn’t as though she wanted Willas to be attracted to her, but it wasn’t that. She just didn’t like feeling so exposed and on display.

“What are you doing here?” Marg asked, “We weren’t expecting you till dinner.”

Myrcella doubted that very much.

“I’m heading into town, wanted to see if you’d realize you needed something,” Willas offered casually.

“Oh how _sweet_ of you,” Marg offered pointedly. “I don’t need anything, but Ella didn’t you want to see if you could find some of that face cream you like.”

“The day before Thanksgiving?” Myrcella couldn’t help but ask, “Won’t it be a madhouse?”

“At the little boutique?” Marg challenged.

“I’m supposed to take a nap with Lenny, and Cole will be back any minute,” she noted, and looked at Willas, “So I think I should stay here.”

“Lenny can nap on her own like she does _every_ day,” Marg pointed out, “And Cole will be very well taken care of. Go on…”

Willas looked at her, “I’ll have you back in an hour. Two tops.”

The three of them were looking at her expectantly. Even Lenny, the traitor, who really ought to have reminded everyone that she and Auntie Ella were supposed to have a sleepover. There was no way to get out of it without being rude, and she didn’t want to be that. Willas was Marg’s brother, who in spite of her meddling right now, was one of the best and most loyal friends she had. And he was kind and undeserving of any rudeness.

“If you promise we don’t have to go to the grocery store,” she prompted.

“Cross my heart and hope to die,” Willas grinned.

She nodded, “I’ll just go change quickly.”

Neither of the Tyrell siblings celebrated, both just nodded calmly as though that was a reasonable next step. It was the sort of calm that came from always getting exactly what you wanted.

Feeling very much like a trapped animal, she padded up the back stairs and through the house up to her gorgeous guest room. She pulled off her bathing suit and grabbed a bra and underwear. She went into her closet and grabbed a loose fitting pair of jeans and stepped into a pair of camel colored flats and a sleeveless white button down. She swiped on some deodorant and brushed her teeth and then grabbed her phone and bag.

She couldn’t help but glance at her phone to see if Robb had texted. Her heart flip flopped when she saw that he had.

They’d been texting a bit last night and this morning, even though she’d been cooking and his whole family had been arriving. She’d gotten reports of the arrivals. Sansa, Jon and Lya had arrived late last night and then in the morning Bran had arrived first, coming up from school and going immediately into his room to finish a paper he had to send by midnight. Arya had been next and Wes already had learned a new swear word. The rest of the troops had arrived just as she was sitting down to lunch and it sounded like the Starks were having a wonderful start to their holiday.

The text he’d sent was a picture of Sansa. She was in the kitchen that must belong to Brynden, in the Tully family home. Wes and Lya were in the foreground, making identical screaming faces while Sansa was a blur behind them as she clearly set about cooking tomorrow’s meal for everyone.

Robb had sent it along with a message: _She won’t let me help._

Myrcella laughed and wrote back: _Just follow behind and pick up bowls when she’s done with them. You’ll be her hero._

Robb started typing back immediately: _Are you suggesting I’m only good for clean up duty?_

She grinned: _I would never! (but yes, in this moment, yes I am)_

The bubbles appeared immediately and then he said: _I’d be wounded but I just picked up a dish she was done with and she looked like she was going to cry. You’re so wise._

She laughed and tucked her phone in her bag and padded down the stairs. It was impossible to wipe the smile from her face, so that’s how she greeted Willas who was waiting in the foyer.

“All set?” he asked.

“All set,” she agreed.

He opened the door for her and she stepped back out into the sunshine. She pulled her sunglasses from her bag and set them on her face. Willas touched her upper back lightly as he walked them towards his car.

“I hope you don’t mind, but I brought the convertible today,” he told her.

“I don’t mind at all,” she told him honestly, “It’s so beautiful here it’ll give me an opportunity to see everything.”

He looked at her, “You mean you’re _not_ worried about your hair?”

“Why do you say that like it’s a rarity?” she wondered.

He chuckled, “Because you’re absolutely singular.” His eyes turned soft, “In all things, as much as this.”

Her stomach lurched but she forced a grim smile onto her face and shrugged, “I give you full permission to remind me I said I didn’t care when it is an absolute _bird’s nest_ at the end of the drive.”

“Deal,” he agreed.

He walked her to the car and opened the door for her. It was a beautiful little thing, racing green with tan leather seats, tortoiseshell details. He took a seat in the drivers and pulled on his sunglasses and flashed her a movie star grin.

“Buckle up, gorgeous,” he said and then cocked his head to the side, “You don’t get car sick, do you?”

“No,” she shook her head and asked, “Why? Am I about to?”

He chuckled but didn’t answer and turned on the purring motor. With that he pulled out of the circular drive and down the long one. When they got to the end of Tommy and Marg’s property he pulled them easily onto the road, accelerating smoothly but swiftly.

The roads were windy and hilly and though he drove with absolute precision there was a sense of joy there too. This was the sort of road and he was the sort of man this car was made for.

She couldn’t help but think of Robb. Though she didn’t feel unsafe with Willas, who had one hand on the steering wheel and the other on the stick shift, both perfectly at ease, she had come to enjoy being driven by Robb. He was such a safe, steady driver, his arm going in front of her protectively whenever someone cut in front of them. His SUV as solid as he was.

It was here too, in Willas’ driving. That calmness from always getting exactly what you wanted. Of never losing anything that truly mattered to you.

The sort of confidence that came from having no idea what to fear.

“Have you explored much of the area?” he asked her.

“Not a ton, no,” she admitted, her heart seizing with fear when he turned to look at her. “Everything I’ve seen though is lovely.”

“I’m biased of course, but I think it’s idyllic, there are so many little towns you’d love around here,” he told her, though she had no idea how he would know what she’d love. “I’d love to take you to one or two, maybe on Friday?”

“Oh,” she gulped, “You know, Gendry has to leave on Friday night… so I think I’ll probably spend the day with him. But thank you, for offering.”

Willas nodded as though that made quite a lot of sense, and accelerated slightly as they wound around a turn.

“I’m beginning to understand your question,” she informed him, “About getting car sick, I mean.”

He chuckled, “Should I slow down?”

“That’s alright,” she evaded.

“Tommy always said you were brave,” Willas noted, “Glad to see it’s true.”

“He said that?” she asked.

“That surprises you?” Willas wondered. “Well, he says you’re the bravest person he knows. And the brightest and kindest too.”

“He should be charging me for all this PR,” she joked, though inside her heart was bursting.

“Oh, stop it,” Willas noted, “Anyone with eyes can see it’s true.”

“Thank you,” she offered, because a kind statement always deserved one. Then, desperate to get them off the subject she asked, “So what do you need in town?”

“Oh,” Willas said and she turned to look at him. To her immense surprise she saw a blush running up his cheeks. It was chased away by a grin though and he said, “You know, you’d think I could have thought of something, wouldn’t you? The truth is, my sister thinks we ought to spend some time together. And since Margy is always right about everything – the way you sisters always seem to be – I happen to agree.”

“Oh,” she said.

Though she had known that it still surprised her that he’d said it.

“You don’t seem happy about that,” Willas noted.

He didn’t say it as an accusation but merely an observation.

“If it makes you feel better,” she sighed, “I’m absolutely singular in that, too. Every other girl in the country would be delighted to hear what you just said, coming from you.”

“May I ask why you’re not?” he wondered, “I’m not suggesting you’re right, about every other girl, mind you. I just… would like to know. Because I think you’re beautiful, and wonderful, but I have no desire to make myself a nuisance and ruin your holiday.”

Last year, she could have told him she wasn’t ready. Or that she never would be. She could have told him that Trystane was the only man for her.

Now though, she couldn’t hide behind that. She could have told him about Robb, but she found that she wanted to be brave and not hide behind anything.

“I don’t know,” she told him honestly, “You’re beautiful and wonderful too, don’t think I don’t know it. And far more gracious than anyone else would be about this.”

“It’s just not there, with me, is it?” he asked.

“No,” she admitted, “I’m sorry.”

“Don’t be,” he told her, “Really. Marg will be very disappointed, and I won’t deny that I am too, but I appreciate you telling me. Now I just need to find another girl who won’t mind riding with the top down.”

She smiled, her first genuine one with him, “Can I help?”

He grinned and handed her his phone, “Code is 2324, start swiping.”

She groaned, “There’s your _first_ problem. You’re a catch, Willas, you’ve got to stay off the apps.”

“Alright,” he sighed, and then said, “Well if you’re going to be imparting your wisdom, I think I at least owe you a scoop of rose ice cream, don’t you?”

“Make it two, and I’ll have you married off by this time next year,” she teased.

He chuckled and accelerated and she leaned her back against the seat and tilted her face up to the sun. She realized then that she’d lied. She did get car sick, she just didn’t notice until her stomach started to settle, along with her heart.

***

“I can’t move,” Jon grumbled beside him. Robb turned to look at him and Jon shook his head, his eyes wide, “I _literally_ can’t move.”

“ _Figuratively_ ,” Bran noted. Jon looked at him. _“Figuratively_.” Jon grabbed the throw pillow that was behind his head and chucked it at Bran. His younger brother dodged it easily and said, “See? Figuratively.”

Robb smirked as Jon shook his head, mumbling about not getting any respect.

Thanksgiving really had been gluttonous. Sansa hadn’t stopped cooking since she’d woken yesterday morning. In fact, she’d started Tuesday night before she went to bed. Bran and Arya had helped, and he’d gotten an unfair amount of credit for cleaning up used mixing bowls and measuring cups, but it had really all been Sansa.

Ever since his Mom had passed away, she’d taken up the mantle. She was the only one his Mom ever allowed in the kitchen when preparing for the holidays, none of the rest of them could be trusted. Sansa though, since she was a little girl, had been his Mom’s special helper. Sometimes he’d be relied upon for the more menial tasks, like crushing pecans with a hammer, but it was Sansa who she taught how to make the pie crust and the special way of cutting the vegetables to lay the nicely.

Though nothing would ever be the same as one of his Mom’s holidays, Sansa’s were as close as anything ever would be, and were unbelievable in their own right.

“Best yet, Dovey,” he told her.

She was curled up with Lya against their Dad and she gave him a satisfied, exhausted smile, “Thanks.”

Wes was already sleeping on the floor on Grey Wind, but Lya was fighting it, not wanting to lose out on time with the whole family. He understood that feeling well.

They’d been having a great time, though they always did. Last night his Dad had cooked them all his famous pasta and meatballs at his house, and they’d filled the dining room easily. Theon had come too and had then convinced them all to play drinking games as though he wasn’t in his mid-thirties. Sansa and Arya had trounced Theon and Jon so thoroughly in beer pong that Theon decided it might just be time to retire entirely, and Rickon had taught them all a few, ignoring the way their Dad looked on in horror – which was fair, given that Rickon was seventeen.

Everyone except Sansa and Bran had gone to the football game today and by the time it had ended it was time for everyone to change for dinner.

Robb grabbed his phone out of his pocket and glanced at it.

“Dude,” Theon groaned. “You owe me five bucks.”

Robb grinned, “I never agreed to that.”

“Yeah,” Rickon noted, “But _we_ did.”

He ignored them, because he had a text from Ella. His first since 10 A.M.

_Just so you know, you and Wes are two of the things Cole is grateful for. Part of the OFFICIAL list._

His heart leapt in his chest and he typed back _Wes said stuffing, but I know he was THINKING you and Cole._

To his delight the typing bubbles appeared immediately and his grin widened when her next text came in saying _I’ll be honored to lose to stuffing any day._

Robb: _And did you have a Happy Thanksgiving?_

Ella: _Did YOU have a Happy Thanksgiving?_

Robb: _Very happy._

Ella: _Will you tell me about it?_

She could have just been asking, but for some reason he doubted it. He stood up from the couch and walked out to the sounds of his siblings heckling him.

They’d been giving him a fair amount of crap about Ella. Or rather, how often he checked his phone looking to see if he’d gotten anything from her. It was decided last night that he was even worse than Rickon, who had a dopey smile on his face half the night from texting his new girlfriend Lyanna Mormont.

It was good-natured, the teasing, as it came with an overwhelming approval of his choice by Jon and Sansa, and no one seemed to care that he didn’t even know what he and Ella were.

He walked down the long hall to the library. This room had always been his favorite, even as a boy, with old maps of the Riverlands and larger Westeros on the walls and books of family history amidst the others on the shelf.

Robb sat on one of the dark green leather couches and dialed her.

“What are you doing?” she chided softly.

“Just wanted to talk to a pretty girl,” he told her.

“I don’t want to pull you away from your family,” she told him.

“They’re sick of me,” he said, and added more accurately, “And moments from a group food coma.”

She let out a warm laugh, but it sounded weak, “You sound cozy.”

“I’m in the library at Brynden’s,” he told her, “You’d like it here.”

“I do like it there,” she noted, and then added quickly, “I was at an event there last year, maybe the year before. Just in case you thought Brynden and I were hanging out without you.”

He chuckled, “I wouldn’t put it past him.”

“So, have you been having a wonderful time?” she asked.

“We have,” he confirmed, “And I’ve got _big_ news.”

“Tell me,” she pleaded.

“Rickon’s coming to school here,” he couldn’t keep the grin from his face.

His youngest brother had told him at the football game that day, as though he’d just decided. The youngest of all of them, he was so accustomed to everyone leaving, and he had decided come to the Riverlands where he would at least be guaranteed him and Wes, and Brynden and Edmure. His Mom would be so happy for another Stark boy to be amongst her family. And he couldn’t wait until next Fall. He’d set a reminder to buy season tickets so that he and Wes could watch Rickon play – Theon would probably want in on it too and Brynden, most likely.

“I’m so happy for you,” she told him. “I know you were hoping he’d decide to.”

“I was, I’m sorry for my Dad, but he seems happy enough to have another reason to come down here,” he noted.

“And you’ll have your brother around,” she said, and he could hear the smile in her voice.

“What happened?” he asked.

She was silent for a long moment. For a moment, a brief one, he doubted himself.

“There’s just been some…,” she trailed off as though trying to think of the right word, “Opinions here tonight.”

“On a holiday with extended family? Shocking,” he teased, knowing that if he could get her to really laugh, she’d be more easily convinced to tell him.

“I know, we’re very original,” she joked back, though there was little humor in her voice.

“What were the opinions about?” he wondered.

“Me,” she sighed. “Not just me… but… are you sure I’m not taking you away from something you should be doing?”

“No,” he swallowed, “Something tells me I’m doing exactly what I’m supposed to right now.”

“So do you remember at the Harvest Festival when you were walking me back to my car, you asked me if my siblings worry about me?” she asked.

He nodded, though she couldn’t see him, “Yeah, you told me mostly your sisters-in-law.”

“That’s… that’s right,” she agreed. “Margaery in particular. She’s always worried about me, ever since… and she’s so caring and helpful, but she’s also a little bit…”

“Controlling?” he suggested.

“No, not controlling…,” she mused.

“Judgy?” he asked.

She laughed, “No… well yes, but no… she’s more… mischievous? Meddlesome is maybe a better word for her…”

“Okay,” he noted, so that she knew he was with her.

“And anyway, you know how I haven’t dated anyone, before you if – let’s table that, but you know I haven’t dated anyone since?” she prompted.

  
“Yes…” he agreed warily.

“Okayso,” she breathed out in one word, “A couple of years ago Cole and I came down here to visit and Margaery’s oldest brother Willas had just gotten a divorce. It was sort of made known then that she thought the two of us should get together, you know she um, kept sort of pushing us together and what not. And I wasn’t interested, I just never was, and I always just told her I wasn’t ready, that I wasn’t dating anyone… that I wouldn’t want to.”

“Right,” he said because it seemed he should say something.

“Well so anyway, he’s here and they sort of… I thought Tommy or Gendry was picking up Cole and I from our flight but it ended up being him,” she went on and his stomach was churning, “And then yesterday he showed up and I sort of got pushed into going into town with him. And I told him I wasn’t interested in him and he was _great_ about it, but we were still being pushed together today and Marg made a comment after most people had left and Willas told her it wasn’t going to happen and she got really angry with me and then you can imagine how Gendry reacted to that. And she accused him and Tommy of coddling me and Gendry responded with _because we mind our own fucking business_? And now he and Marg aren’t talking and Tommy’s in the middle and I guess I am too and it just sort of sucked.”

“Can I ask some questions?” he asked.

“You can ask me anything,” she promised.

“Why is Margaery angry with you?” he asked, “I mean… did… something happen between you and Willas? Sorry, that’s none of my business.”

“I think of everyone in this scenario, it is most definitely _your_ business,” she teased and he tried to smile even though she couldn’t see him. “No, nothing ever happened between us. I don’t even think it’s about Willas, you know. I guess he was sort of interested in me but it’s not like there are any real feelings there. I think with Marg it’s really coming from a place of concern. And… that’s what bothers me. I hate… I think I have a hard time… when people are concerned about me it makes me feel…”

“Inadequate,” he supplied, remembering their conversation from the Harvest Festival.

“Yeah,” she agreed. “Like I’m failing somehow, you know. I think around year two she and other people in my family were expecting me to get back out there, you know? And when I didn’t I disappointed them. And I think with Willas… her mindset was always that I had no idea whether he was the right guy or not because I didn’t give him a chance because I wasn’t ready.”

“Is she right about that?” he asked. “I mean, now that you’re ready… do you… want to give him a chance?”

“Um…,” she said.

“Oh, fuck, you do?” he said before he could stop himself, “I was bluffing.”

She let out a surprised giggle and quickly assured him, “No, no, I definitely don’t. I’m sorry I would have started with that if I thought you’d… you read me so well that sometimes I forget you’re not actually privy to my thoughts. I was just trying to think of how to say something…”

“Oh, okay,” he breathed a little easier, “Take your time.”

He heard her take a deep breath and then she said, “I’m not saying this to put pressure on you or us or anything, it’s just the simple truth. I never gave Willas, or anyone else for that matter, a chance because I wasn’t ready. A part of me was convinced I never would be, but then I met you. And I didn’t realize it until lately, but it wasn’t about timing at all. If I’d met you year three or four, that’s when I would have become ready. It’s just like you said that time? That you were only going to be ready for me. Well, I think I was only ever going to be ready for you too, and if we’d met earlier it might have taken me longer, but I don’t think anyone else… I’m sorry, I’m rambling. I don’t like that I can’t see your face right now.”

“It’s uh, basically just a smile at this point,” he confessed.

It had taken over his whole face and he knew it was obvious in his voice.

“Really?” she asked anyway, but he could hear the one in hers too.

“Yeah, really,” he confirmed.

“I wasn’t trying to freak you out about Willas,” she told him.

“I know,” he promised.

“I probably shouldn’t have told you all that,” she noted.

“I’m exactly who you should tell about it,” he argued. Then wanted to make sure she hadn’t been pressured by him, “So he was fine about it?”

“A total gentleman,” she offered brightly. “I’m going to set him up with Shireen.”

“Ella,” he chuckled, “Haven’t you learned not to meddle?”

“Not to meddle with people who don’t want to be meddled with,” she amended, “They both have _asked_ me for help in that regard. And they both love to sail and are cat people. He’s been dating models and can’t stand another diva and she just so happens to _look_ like a model but is totally down to earth.”

“Mmhm,” he teased.

She giggled, “Okay I’ll keep you out of my schemes.”

“No no I want to be a part of your schemes,” he told her, “I just also want to have the ability to say _I told you so_ when they backfire.”

“A modest proposal,” she agreed.

“You should talk to Marg,” he told her, “I know you’re not asking for my advice but… just tell her what you told me. I never told you this but Sansa, Jon and I kind of got into it after the Harvest Festival.”

“What?” she asked, “Really? But we had such a lovely time.”

“We did,” he confirmed, “And they could see how I felt about you, and I wasn’t really okay with those feelings. You know I uh… had a lot of guilt about it and… Anyway… I was really pissed because I felt the same, you know, that I was somehow failing, but that wasn’t what it was.”

“What was it?” she wondered softly.

“That they had watched someone they love be unhappy for a very long time,” he told her simply, as Jon had told him, “And it hurt.”

“Yeah,” she all but whispered. “I’ll talk to her.”

“Good,” he agreed, “But first, there’s something I’ve been meaning to ask you.”

“What’s that?” she indulged.

“Will you go out on a date with me?” he asked her.

He hadn’t asked that question for the first time in eight years. He’d forgotten how nerve wracking it was, even when you were fairly certain of the answer.

“A date?” she repeated, the excitement in her voice beckoning his own, “I’d _love_ to.”

“Great,” he smiled, his cheeks hurting from the force of it, “How’s next Friday?”

“It’s perfect,” she told him. “Ooh I’m nervous.”

He chuckled, “You should be, I’m an awful date.”

She giggled, “Oh I’ll just bet.”

“Do you think Marg and Gendry will make up?” he asked.

“Oh, yeah,” she told him, “They always get into it when they are together. They argue with each other more than either of them does with their actual siblings. I think they rather enjoy it.”

“I miss you,” he told her, apropos of nothing at all except the sheer overwhelming fact of it.

“I miss you,” she told him, “It’s nice.”

“Yeah,” he agreed, “It is.”

“ _Hey, no come in,”_ he heard her say to someone else, “Hey, Marg is here. Can we talk tomorrow?”

“Let me know how it goes,” he requested, “Goodnight.”

“Night,” she said, “Thank you. Really.”

“You’re welcome, really,” he said and waited for her to hang up.

She did after another moment and he was going to get up and rejoin the others but he wasn’t ready to. He wanted to just sit there and remember her voice telling him that it was only going to be him.

“How is she?” a voice asked from the doorway and he looked over and saw his Dad there.

“She’ll be okay,” he told him, “Just some family stuff.”

His Dad nodded and stepped into the library, sitting in one of the armchairs opposite him.

“She’s pretty important, huh?” he asked.

Robb nodded, “I think so. I mean she is, but we haven’t even been on a first date.”

His Dad waved his hand, “A formality, if that conversation was anything to go by.”

“How long were you listening?” Robb wondered.

“Long enough to know the answer to my question,” his Dad said. “So Ella, is it?”

He nodded, “Myrcella, but we call her Ella.”

“Myrcella…” his Dad asked, “What’s her last name?”

“Martell,” his brow furrowed. “Do you know her?”

His Dad shook his head, “Is that her maiden name?”

“No, her married name,” he said, “She’s a Baratheon.”

His Dad looked almost ashen, “She’s Robert’s?”

“Robert?” he asked. “Dad?”

“This world gets smaller every damn day,” his Dad told him. “When I was young, younger than you, Robert Baratheon was my closest friend. We fell out in our twenties but…”

“You never talked about him,” Robb pointed out.

“If you fell out with Jon or Theon a decade ago, would you talk about them with Wes?” his Dad asked.

Robb didn’t know how to answer that because he couldn’t imagine falling out with Jon or Theon. His Dad was the most loyal person he’d ever known. Likely, when he and Robert were friends, he couldn’t picture ever falling out with him either.

“No,” he answered.

“You were named for him,” his Dad said, “I should have named you for Brandon but I wasn’t ready. So, I named you after Robert. The other brother I’d lost.”

“Please don’t hold that against her-,” he started.

“She is no more responsible for what happened between us than you are,” his Dad pointed out. He shook his head, “So Robert was her father, and if she has his name she must be Cersei’s daughter.” Robb nodded, he knew that but little else. Ella never spoke about her parents. His Dad made it clear there was good reason for that when he said, “That can’t have been easy.”

“No,” he told him, “I don’t think it was.” His Dad looked at him and he shook his head, “You’d never see it.”

“But you do,” his Dad mused.

He shrugged, “She let me.”

“Well,” his Dad said, “Then you must be important, too.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> ya'll still with me?


	18. Chapter 18

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Ahhh love love loved all the comments on the last chapter! 
> 
> This is just a short little follow-up, all from Myrcella's POV, that deals with the aftermath of Thanksgiving.

“I brought you some tea,” Marg told her from the doorway.

“Is it tea or a love potion?” Myrcella teased.

Marg smiled and said, “It’s just jasmine, but I’m hoping it’ll make you remember that you love me.”

She rolled her eyes, “As if I needed reminding. I’ll take the tea though.”

Margaery smiled and stepped into her room, closing the door and then padded over to the bed. Myrcella took the tea gratefully, relishing in the heat radiating off the fine, delicate teacup. She took a tentative sip and the calm that had settled in her heart during her conversation with Robb started to spread through her body.

“Thank you,” she said and gestured to the bed, “Do you want to sit?”

Marg perched on the edge of the bed and Myrcella tucked her legs up underneath her to give her more room. She took another sip as Marg settled herself further onto it. She had changed out of the gorgeous pantsuit she’d been wearing earlier and was in a pale blue silk robe. Her beautiful face had been scrubbed clean and her hair had been brushed out. Likely by Lenny who loved to brush hair, particularly her mother’s thick, silken mane.

“I shouldn’t have pushed Willas at you,” Marg told her. “I knew that I shouldn’t. Tommen told me I shouldn’t. Gendry told me I shouldn’t, which actually made me want to do it more if I’m being honest. But I did.”

“Yeah,” Myrcella agreed. Then asked, “Did you mean what you said? About Tommy and Gendry coddling me?”

Margaery looked at her for a long moment and nodded, “Yes. I think they walk on eggshells around you.”

Myrcella felt a lump in her throat, “But I worked so… okay.”

“Tell me,” Marg prompted.

Myrcella looked down at her lap, wondering why the words that had moments earlier tumbled so freely from her lips got caught in her throat now.

“I just worked really hard to be in a place where you all didn’t need to do that,” she told her.

“Did you?” Marg asked and Myrcella looked up at her, “Or did you work really hard to _seem_ like you were in a place where we didn’t need to do that?” Margaery shrugged, “We’re not your Mother. We’re not your Grandfather, or my Grandmother for that matter. In spite of what our surroundings suggest, appearances are not all that matter to us.”

“I know that,” Myrcella said softly, but it sounded untruthful even to her. “No… I… It makes me feel small.”

“What does?” Marg asked.

“You all… worrying about me, talking about me, _meddling_ about me,” she offered in a stronger tone. “I know that you mean well but it makes me feel _small_.”

Marg looked at her but said nothing and Myrcella took a sip of her tea, hoping for another surge of calm. When it didn’t come, she placed it down on her bedside table and waited, knowing that Marg’s mind was working diligently behind her pale blue eyes.

“I think… no,” Marg shook her head.

“Go on,” Myrcella pleaded, “No more eggshells.”

“I don’t know that I think it’s us that makes you feel small,” Margaery told her then. And then as though she’d been waiting years for the opportunity, told her, “I think you do it to yourself. I think you’ve done it to yourself for a long time. In fact, I think the only time you didn’t do it was when you were loved by Trystane. I think he made you unafraid to take up space, to shine brightly. He made you forget the importance of drawing in the lines. And I think you liked that feeling, but without him you lack the confidence to do so. So, you’ve reverted back to who you were before you met him. The girl who was more concerned with seeming perfect than being happy. Wanting to do enough so that no one had to worry but not enough that you’d be accused of seeking attention. A gorgeous prop that always did what was required but never stole the show. But I think… I think you know… I think he showed you, that you’re more than that. That you were always supposed to be more than that. And I think you know that if he were here, he would… he would want you to shine _so brightly_. So, when you see us worry about you, I don’t think you’re worried about disappointing us. I think you’re worried about disappointing him, because you know deep down that you’re holding back in a way you shouldn’t be. That he wouldn’t want you to. And I think _that’s_ what makes you feel small.”

There were a lot of things that she could say to that. A lot of things she wanted to say to that.

All she said was, “You didn’t know me before Trystane.”

“No,” Margaery agreed, “But I met Tommen as he was before me. And I see those parts of himself even now, when he forgets.”

“Forgets what?” she asked.

“That my love isn’t conditional,” she shrugged, “That our relationship is not transactional. That there isn’t a scoreboard overhead or a tightrope underfoot.”

Myrcella nodded, “When you can fly, there’s nothing to fear from a tightrope. As silly as it is to say, Trystane made me feel like I could fly.”

“It doesn’t sound silly to me,” Marg told her, and she shook her head, “And El, seeing the way he looked at you, I wasn’t entirely convinced you couldn’t. But you, who you are now, is no less miraculous than who you were with him. You just need to dust off the old wings and _jump_.”

“And that’s why you pushed me headfirst?” Myrcella grinned.

Marg laughed, “I prefer that story to the one where I’m the meddlesome bitch.”

“Gendry’s an unreliable narrator,” Myrcella pointed out.

“Aren’t we all,” Marg agreed. “But really, I’m sorry. Both for pushing Willas at you and responding the way I did earlier.”

“Thank you,” Myrcella noted. Then wondered, “Why did you, this time, I mean? I mean it’s not like you’ve been exactly _subtle_ in the past… but…”

Marg grinned and then thought about it, “I guess I’ve just noticed a change in you recently. I thought maybe you were ready.”

_Just tell her what you told me._

“Well…,” Myrcella said and Marg glanced at her. She could feel her cheeks flush as she said, “You weren’t entirely wrong.”

Margaery’s pale blue eyes wandered over her face, the eyes that missed absolutely nothing, the ones that noticed a loose button from clear across a room.

“No, no I wasn’t wrong at _all_ was I?” Margaery asked her. And then suddenly asked, “It’s Robb, isn’t it?”

“Yes,” Myrcella gushed.

Margaery’s mouth dropped open, “I’m such an _idiot_. Has something happened? Is that who you were just talking to?”

“You’re not an idiot,” she assured her, “But yes… to both of those things.”

Margaery squealed and then crawled up the bed and landed on the pillows next to her, “Tell me everything you little minx.”

Myrcella laughed and fell back against the pillows, turning on her side, “I’m not sure I’ve done anything terribly _minxlike_.”

“Don’t tease me,” Margaery begged. “Tell me everything, start to finish.”

So she did.

She told Margaery everything. From that very first morning drop-off to their day at the science museum. The easy dinners with the kids and how she actually looked forward to doing the dishes when he’d be there next to her. Meeting Sansa and Jon and hearing all about Jeyne. Gilly and Sam and Brynden. His arms wrapping around her and the steady way he drove. Wes’ sweet nature and the way Cole would act like Robb for days on end after a weekend spent together. His lips on hers, so unexpectedly, and yet so predictably. Not in the boring sense but in the inevitable one.

“I tell him every single thing I’m thinking,” she confessed, “Before I even know I’ve thought it.”

She looked at Marg and to her surprise she saw tears in her sister-in-law’s eyes, “I’m such an idiot.”

“No? Why?” Myrcella asked, “I should have told you.”

“You shouldn’t have had to,” Marg noted, “It’s so obvious.”

“It is?” Myrcella wondered, “What, exactly?”

Marg smiled, “That you’re happy.”

She couldn’t help but smile back, “You’re right. I forgot what it felt like.”

“So have you…,” Marg prompted, “You know.”

She giggled, “No! He only kissed me two weeks ago.”

“But you’re going to,” Marg concluded.

“Eventually, that’s what usually happens,” Myrcella evaded.

“So demure,” Marg cackled, “You want it so bad!” Myrcella covered her cheeks in her hands and rolled onto her stomach. “Atta girl,” Marg said and Myrcella giggled, her entire body wiggling.

She did want him. Badly. Her mind went to him constantly, it had done from the start before she’d even realized why. Now though, she thought of his arms, and his hands on her waist and her thighs, his lips on her throat, the muscles of his back.

When he kissed her she forgot where she was, everything she was supposed to be doing.

Margaery was silent and she turned to look at her and saw her typing on her phone.

“That’s it?” she wondered, “Your big interrogation?”

Marg chuckled, “This is intermission, I’m looking him up.”

“Marg!” she chided.

Her sister-in-law ignored her and Myrcella rolled her eyes and grabbed her phone. To her delight but not her surprise, she had a text from Robb.

_How’d it go?_

She bit her lip and typed back _You’re being investigated._

The typing bubbles appeared quickly and she smiled when she saw _FCC or DEA?_

_Worse. Margaery and an internet search engine._

She giggled when he replied _Looks like I’ve got to go back on the run._

“I don’t even care that you’re giggling like a schoolgirl right now, look at his eyes,” Margaery shoved a picture of Robb’s face in front of her. “Are they really that blue?”

Myrcella’s heart raced as she looked at the zoomed in picture of Robb and shook her head, “Bluer. Deeper. _Dreamier_.”

Marg squealed and pulled her phone bag and kept scrolling, muttering something about fair hiring practices and sustainable innovation.

“Wow, is that his wife?” Margaery asked, tilting the phone towards her more gently.

Myrcella peered over it and saw the face of the woman she’d seen many times. In all her life, she’d never seen an adult who looked kinder. Wes was an absolute ode to her.

“That’s her, Jeyne,” Myrcella agreed, “ _Beautiful_ , wasn’t she?”

“Stunning,” Marg agreed. “It’s been three years?”

“Just over,” Myrcella agreed, her eyes still on Jeyne’s face.

“She looks like the sort of woman who would want him to be happy,” Marg determined.

“You’re just saying that to make me feel better,” Myrcella sighed.

“No more eggshells, remember?” Marg asked, “I mean it. Three years, five. It’s been long enough. Trystane…” Marg started and then stopped. Myrcella turned to look at her and Marg shook her head, “He’d want you to be excited about someone again.”

It was a big statement, but somehow Myrcella didn’t quite believe it was the one she’d wanted to say. Incomplete, almost.

“Marg-,” Myrcella started to say, because now that the truth was out, she was hungry for all of it.

“Oh, oh, oh,” Marg squealed, “I have him shirtless!”

“What?” Myrcella asked, “Why? Where, let me see!”

Marg clutched the phone against her chest and her blue eyes looked into hers, “I lied. I don’t have him shirtless. I just wanted to see your reaction.”

“You,” Myrcella pointed, “Are _such_ a bitch.”

“And you,” Marg informed her, “Have got it _bad_.”

Myrcella fell back against the pillows, looking up at her ceiling.

“I’ve got it so bad,” she admitted.

Marg looked at her and then back at her phone, “Tell me you’ve gnawed on his jaw.”

“Only a little,” Myrcella mumbled.

Marg cackled and kept scrolling and Myrcella looked at her phone.

_Any verdict?_

Myrcella glanced at Margaery and then typed back: _Yes. It is with a heavy heart that I tell you Margaery has confirmed what we knew all along… You are mighty fine, Robb Stark._

*

Over breakfast the next morning, Gendry and Margaery made up. Of course, Margaery got mad at Gendry _again_ when it became clear that he had known about Robb, though admittedly not that anything had happened.

She and Tommy had convinced them to let bygones be bygones and as it was Gendry’s last day, they both agreed. The four of them had taken Cole and Lenny to the little private beach behind Tommy and Marg’s house, packing a lunch of peanut butter sandwiches and fruit. Cole had gotten bronze in the time they’d been here, his skin greeting the sun like an old friend while her nose turned pink no matter how much sunblock she put on it.

Tommy and Gendry had taken the kids swimming as she and Marg sat in beach chairs side by side, tearing recipes out of cooking magazines as Marg told her all about her Spring line. Her family’s fashion company had been a fixture at award shows and in glossy magazines for generations, but everyone who mattered in the fashion world agreed that Marg’s talent and vision was going to secure its future when so many of the old guard were dying out.

She designed blue jeans so luxurious you wouldn’t feel out of place wearing emeralds along with them and couture that felt like pajamas. A designer for the girl who wanted to wear a leather jacket by day and diamonds at night, who spritzed perfume on to sleep alone.

Every year she went back to Riverrun with a whole slew of new clothes and this year would be no different and she’d return in the spring for the shows, often helping out backstage, even walking in the show one year when one of the models had come down with the flu.

When the sun was at its highest they’d laid Cole and Lenny down side by side in the shade and the kids had taken a nap in the open air.

Gendry had left right before dinner, but she’d been able to part with him more easily knowing that he had cause to be back in the Riverlands in a matter of weeks. She was tempted to ask if they could be expecting more of him but didn’t want to make him feel guilty. Already she was seeing him more this year than she ever got to.

The sun had taken it out of all of them, so when Myrcella put Cole down for the night she’d padded to her room. She was going to just crawl into bed, but she filled the bath instead, pouring in some of the lavender oil that she knew would sooth her pink shoulders.

She brought her phone with her so that she could listen to music, turning on a quiet, pretty playlist.

Her phone beeped beside her after a few minutes and she wondered if it was Gendry confirming he’d arrived back in King’s Landing.

It wasn’t though, it was Robb.

_What are you up to?_

She bit her lip, but she couldn’t stop her minxlike grin, _I don’t think I should tell you_.

The bubbles appeared immediately _I think you should._

She typed back and then closed her eyes as she pressed send. Her phone buzzed almost immediately.

_You. Myrcella Martell. Are in the bath. Right now._

_Confirmed,_ she wrote back.

RS: _How can you think you shouldn’t tell me that? This is very important information._

RS: _Haunting information, but important information. Cruel information, but important information._

RS: _Are there bubbles?_

She giggled and wrote back: _No bubbles I’m afraid._

He started typing back and then stopped. And then started typing again and then stopped. And again, and then once more.

And then her phone rang.

She answered, “ _Yes_?”

“Hi,” he greeted her. “How are you?”

She laughed, “I’m good, Robb. How are you?”

“Well, you know, in a fair amount of pain but otherwise just peachy,” he told her.

There was something in his voice that she’d never heard before.

“Robb…,” she started and then asked, “Are you drunk?”

“Drunk is a very strong word, Miss Ella,” he told her.

She giggled, “You’re drunk dialing me!”

“You told me you were in the bath!” he argued.

“That’s true,” she admitted, “That was rather mean.”

“And from someone _so nice_ ,” Robb agreed.

“Are you having fun wherever you are? Where are you, by the way?” she wondered.

It sounded louder than if he was just at his house or Brynden’s.

“Some bar Theon likes,” Robb dismissed, “Let’s focus on you.”

“ _Robb_ ,” she smiled.

“I love hea- _what? No. Edmure. Why wouldn’t I be talking to Edmure right now, he’s my uncle,”_ Robb lied poorly to someone else. “ _Stand back, no! Get -oof_.”

“Ella?” a different voice asked in her ear.

“Jon?” she asked as she placed it.

“ _I knew you weren’t talking to Edmure!_ ” Jon chided and then said to her, “I’m sorry. He wasn’t supposed to call you.”

He said it as though they’d had an agreement. A vow Robb had broken with little thought.

“Why not?” she couldn’t help but ask.

“Theon would tell you that it was because it’s _boys_ night,” Jon told her, “But uh, actually he’s had two whiskeys and he really _can’t_ hold his liquor anymore.”

She smiled, but couldn’t help but ask, “How are you all getting home?”

Jon was silent for a minute and then the background noise died down and she thought she heard a door close, “I’ve had a couple drinks too, so I’m just going to say this: You are so good for him.”

Her insides turned to molasses, “Really?”

“Yeah,” he sighed, “Really. Just that question alone, it’s exactly what he’d ask you. I don’t know – _Robb stop banging on the door! I don’t give a shit if it’s your phone you broke the pact. –_ Sorry, what was I saying?”

She laughed, “Something kind about the best friend you’re terrorizing right now.”

He chuckled, “Sounds about right.”

“Jon?” she asked.

“Yeah?” he asked her.

“Can I talk to him? Just for a minute. I’ll turn my phone on silent for the rest of the night,” she promised.

“One minute,” Jon said, “And something tells me I’m going to fail again later so if you wake up to voicemails, you have to delete them immediately without listening to them.”

She laughed, “Deal.”

“Alright one second,” Jon said and then she heard him open the door and share some words with Robb.

A moment later it was Robb back in her ear, “Ella?”

“Hi you,” she grinned.

He let out a deep breath, “Hi you.”

“So, you weren’t supposed to call me, huh?” she asked.

“No,” he admitted, “They thought I’d embarrass myself. Am I embarrassing myself?”

“No,” she told him, “You’re not embarrassing yourself. I’m glad you’re having fun.”

“I can’t stop thinking about you,” he told her.

“I’ve stopped trying to stop,” she admitted.

She could hear the smile in his voice, “Really?” Then, “While you’re in the bath?”

“Robb!” she chided, and his warm chuckle flooded into her ear.

“I’m sorry, I’m sorry,” he said though he clearly wasn’t. “Sunday can’t come soon enough.”

When it was decided that he’d drop her and Cole off at the airport it was also decided he’d pick her up. Ever since she’d said goodbye to him she’d been looking forward to stepping off that plane once again.

“Will you bring Wes and stay for dinner? Just take out or something but…,” she trailed off.

“Yeah,” he agreed, then sighed, “Look, Ella, as much as I hate to admit it, I think they’re right. I’m thinking of saying all sorts of stupid things right now so I think I better let you go.”

“Okay,” she acquiesced.

“Okay,” he repeated. “Goodnight, you gorgeous, gorgeous, woman.”

She smiled, “Goodnight, you gorgeous, gorgeous, man… oh and Robb?”

“Yes?” he asked.

“You are taking a taxi, right?” she asked.

He was silent for a moment and then he said, “Yeah we’re not driving. I’ll text you when I get home though.”

“I won’t respond,” she told him, “I promised Jon. But please do.”

“I’ve got to get off this phone,” he warned.

“Goodnight,” she laughed and hung up.

The bath had turned cold while she’d been talking to them so she got out and wrapped a large towel around herself. She dried off and dressed in pajamas and crawled into bed.

She fell asleep thinking of his warm laugh and the idea that there were things he was feeling that he couldn’t yet say.

And when she woke up to three voicemails and six texts, she only glanced at the one that assured her of his safe return home, and deleted the voicemails without listening to them, content that sooner or later, when the time was right, he’d tell her once again.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Hmmm should we show their date next chapter???


	19. Chapter 19

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> ahhh thank you all for your lovely comments on the last chapter. you really have NO idea how much they mean. I will respond to all of them tomorrow but I wanted to post this before bed.
> 
> It is all Robb's POV. I hope you enjoy!

He was thirty-four years old, he ran a successful, international business, he frequently went head-to-head with a five year old over the importance of bath time, and yet his palms were sweating at the prospect of going to dinner with a woman who he’d eaten dinner with many times before.

They’d eaten off paper plates and fine china and everything in between. They’d sat next to each other and across from one another and it had always been very enjoyable. So enjoyable, in fact, that he’d asked her out on a date.

The date he’d been looking forward to all week and dreading all afternoon.

Dreading was the wrong word. He was looking forward to it. It was impossible not to.

At morning drop-off, Ella had told him not to look at her so as not to shatter the illusion for later on. There was no illusion that the sight of her in her black yoga pants and white zip-up could shatter, but he’d resisted telling her so, making a big show of averting his gaze until she had to grab him by the hand so as to avoid him getting hit by an incoming car as they crossed the parking lot.

She’d certainly _seemed_ excited and he was too. This was their first date, after all, and though it was like no first date he’d ever had, it was all the more exciting because of what they already meant to each other.

Exciting and terrifying.

A knock on his bedroom door took him out of his thoughts and he turned to see Gilly standing in the doorway, “You told me to drag you out of here at 7:20 kicking and screaming if need be.”

He glanced at his watch, “It’s 7:18.”

“I know,” she smiled, “I came to give you a pep talk before the kicking and screaming.”

He chuckled and turned to her, “Does this look okay?”

She could have easily dismissed the question but she looked over him. He was wearing a navy blue suit with a white shirt and a tie Sansa had bought him a year or so ago when he’d given her his credit card and free reign to do as she pleased.

Gilly went into his closet without saying a word and came back out holding a slate grey sweater that had also been purchased on Sansa’s expedition.

“Wear this instead of the shirt and tie, with the jacket,” she told him. Offering him a sly smile, “It’s a date, not a board meeting.”

He smirked and took off his jacket and pulled off his tie, starting to unbutton his shirt.

“Avert your gaze, Gilly, your boyfriend’s downstairs,” he teased.

When he’d told Gilly about his date with Ella she had immediately insisted on babysitting. He tried not to have her babysit on nights or weekends, but she was adamant. He knew it had much more to do with wanting the debrief _after_ the date than anything else, but he’d agreed knowing that Wes would be happier with her than anyone else – apart from Ella who would be otherwise engaged. As a compromise though he’d suggested she invite Sam over, so that her Friday evening wasn’t _totally_ devoted to work.

Wes had been very excited that his kindergarten teacher was going to be hanging out “after school” and had already shown Sam the projector that Ella and Cole had gotten him for his birthday.

Gilly turned around and he pulled off his shirt and the sweater on. He put the suit jacket over it and told her he was decent.

“Much better,” she assured him. “How are you doing?”

“Oh, you know, freaking out,” he told her, as he’d told Dr. Selmy earlier that day. “I mean I get it, it’s Ella. It’ll be great. She’s wonderful. Blah, blah, blah.”

“It’ll be great because _you’re_ wonderful too,” Gilly noted. And then wiggled her shoulders, “Just loosen up you’re making me nervous.”

“I will,” he admitted. She glanced at him and he sighed, “I always feel comfortable around her.”

He’d been nervous picking Ella and Cole up from the airport on Sunday afternoon. It felt like a lot had transpired between them since he’d dropped her off at the airport, and his stomach had been jumbled nerves. Especially after rereading the texts he’d sent her and seeing the calls he’d made. As she’d promised Jon, she hadn’t picked up a single one after the first and she had assured him that she’d deleted the texts, too. Which was good, considering he’d compared her to sunshine in one of them.

But all those nerves had faded the moment he’d seen her at baggage claim. Cole was sitting on one of their suitcases and they were playing some kind of hand game, the pair of them laughing hysterically as the moves sped up and up and up. Cole had turned positively bronze and her skin had tanned, an adorable strip of pink on the slope of her nose.

“ _That_ is so far from _blah blah blah_ ,” Gilly noted.

“Yeah,” he agreed, “Yeah that’s about as far from _blah blah blah_ as it gets.”

“Come on,” she pulled him by the arm, “It’s 7:20 and you’re ready.”

There was no kicking and screaming. He allowed Gilly to pull him down the hall and he said his goodnights to Sam, who he was still getting used to not calling Mr. Tarly and who had only just started looking him in the eye again, and Grey Wind and Wes.

Wes knew that he was going to dinner with Ella, but they had decided not to call it a _date_ with the boys. They knew that it was a grown-up dinner and that was all they needed to know at the moment. In truth, Wes hadn’t even questioned it, only wanting to make sure that he’d get time with Ella and Cole later on in the weekend.

He drove the familiar route to Ella’s house and pulled down the long drive. Briefly he considered calling Sansa but he knew he’d just get more of the same of what he got from Gilly and that though it would be sweet it would ultimately be unhelpful. The only thing that would be helpful was getting out of the car and knocking on her door, so that’s what he did.

Except, for the first time ever, seeing her made him less calm.

He understood then why she’d told him not to look at her that morning. Even though she’d looked gorgeous, she’d looked like Ella. Sweet, warm, Ella.

The woman in front of him shared her features but somehow seemed wholly distinct. Her golden hair had been swept off her face and whatever make up she’d used had added little exclamation points to her already emphatic beauty. She wore a pale purple dress of some soft looking material. It was form fitting on the top, tied at the side of her elegant neck, and fell around her newly tanned legs, made all the more enticing from her heels.

“Did I overdo it?” she asked, and he realized he’d been staring at her for what had to be close to a minute without saying anything. “It’s been a long time since…”

“No,” he managed to say, and admitted, “I think you just uh, actually took my breath away.”

And then she smiled. That warm, cozy, Ella smile and the two women merged.

“Well, that makes us even then,” she said, gesturing for him to walk through the already fully opened door.

“ROOOOOOOOOOOBB,” Cole called as he ran into the foyer.

“Hey buddy,” he grinned at Cole in his rocket ship pajamas. “How was school?”

“Good!” Cole told him, “Wes read a _whole_ book in front of the class.”

“He did?” Robb smiled, “He didn’t tell me.”

“Yeah Mr. Tarly let him read before rest time,” Cole told him. “I get to on Monday, but I’m not as good as Wes.”

“You’re a wonderful reader, baby,” Ella stroked Cole’s curls. “We’ve just got to get you as comfortable reading out loud as you are in your head.”

“You should practice with Grey Wind,” Robb found himself suggesting and the pair of them turned to look at him in tandem, “That’s what Wes did. Grey Wind prefers _Fancy Nancy_ but he’ll listen to just about anything.”

Cole giggled, “We have _Fancy Nancy_ upstairs.”

“He’ll be delighted,” Robb agreed.

“Oh!” Cole exclaimed, “I have a secret to tell you.”

He saw Ella smile in his periphery but his focus was on Cole. He crouched down and awaited this evening’s secret eagerly.

“ _Can we hang out tomorrow?_ ,” Cole asked.

Robb grinned and turned so he could whisper in Cole’s ear, “ _I’ll talk to your Mommy. Can she come?”_

Cole giggled and whispered back, “ _She’s always invited_.”

Robb nodded as though that made perfect sense, because it did. He’d had a _guys night_ as promised with Cole and Wes on Wednesday and they’d had a good time, but he knew he was not the only one who found it a little unnecessary.

He stroked Cole’s hair and pressed a kiss to his smooth forehead and stood up.

“All set?” he asked Ella.

She smiled at him and nodded and then her eyes lit up, “Oh wait. You’re going to be so proud.”

He looked at her and then at Cole who was grinning at her too as Ella walked to her hall closet and pulled out a tan rain trench coat and a clear plastic umbrella.

He shook his head and started slow clapping. Cole joined in immediately.

“Thank you, thank you,” she acknowledged as she handed him the umbrella so that she could pull on her coat.

“Alright baby,” she said to Cole, “Be good for Lyla, okay, and I’ll see you in the morning.”

“Yes Mommy,” Cole told her dutifully, “Love you.”

Ella smiled as though it was the first time she’d heard it rather than the sixtieth that day, “I love you.”

“Night Cole,” he said, the statement feeling incomplete.

“Night Robb, and ooh!” Cole said and then swiped his finger across his nose.

Robb chuckled but solemnly returned the gesture.

“Thanks Lyla, call if you need anything,” Ella called.

“Have fun!” a voice called back.

He opened the door for Ella and she walked through it and then he closed it behind them. She looked up at the sky and grinned.

“Of course the one night I’m prepared for rain we won’t get any,” she told him.

It really did look almost stubbornly clear skied, but, “You know you can never say never here.”

She agreed and they headed towards the car. He didn’t know what to say so he told her what he was thinking.

“You know what I like about you?” he asked.

“To be honest, I don’t,” she admitted.

That was a subject they’d be returning to but he told her, “You never ask what Cole’s secrets are.”

She grinned, “Well, they’re not _my_ secrets.”

“I know,” he grinned back, “So I like that you don’t ask. Not that I’d tell you if you did…”

“And _that_ ,” she told him, “Is what I like about you.”

He blushed at that and opened her car door, closing it once she’d gotten settled. They were both fairly quiet on the way to the restaurant, but she always was when he drove, he’d noticed. She let him determine whether they’d talk or not, respecting his desire not to be distracted.

The restaurant was downtown and it was busy so he found a parking spot a little ways away from the restaurant.

“Is this alright with your heels?” he asked, “I can drive you back around and drop you off.”

She was silent for a moment and he turned to look at her. To his surprise there was a huge grin on her face.

“What?” he asked.

“You’re just such a gentleman,” she all but gushed. “Sorry, I sound like a schoolgirl.”

He grinned, “You don’t. But you have a habit of turning me into a teenage boy so if you ever do, we’ll be even… and is that a yes?”

“Yes,” she agreed, “I’ll be fine in my heels.”

They got out of the car and he walked around to the sidewalk, falling into step beside her. He wasn’t sure if he should take her hand or wrap an arm around her waist. This wasn’t a typical first date, in the sense that he’d already held her body against his, but that had always been in the heat of the moment.

So they started walking side by side. After a couple of blocks he felt her hand slip underneath his arm, her body moving closer to him as she wrapped both of her arms around one of his. He was so focused on how good her body felt against him and how sweet she smelled, that he didn’t notice the group of men approaching them.

They weren’t really paying all that much attention to them either, though a few of them gaped openly at Ella. Young professionals, early to mid twenties. The exact sort of guys he worked with every day.

He realized then how different they probably looked to her. A group of loud, headstrong men.

Riverrun was a truly safe place, but like anywhere else it was safer for him than it was for her.

“I don’t go out much at night,” she explained unnecessarily. Then teased, “Don’t I sound lame?”

“Not lame,” he shook his head and teased back, “Just the exact opposite of a vampire.”

She grinned, “I’ve been called worse.”

He chuckled and they both entered the restaurant smiling. The hostess greeted them warmly and ushered them right to their table, which had two modern looking overstuffed chairs that were surprisingly comfortable.

“I’ve never been here,” Ella told him.

“Me either,” he admitted, “But you said you like sushi, right?”

“ _Love_ it,” she noted, “And never get to eat it.”

“Okay good,” he said, “You can order for us then. I’ll eat everything, but I don’t actually know anything.”

She placed her hand over his menu on the table and playfully dragged it towards her.

When their server came to take their drink order, Ella recommended he get a light beer and the server seemed to agree. He took their suggestion and was surprised when Ella ordered one too.

He didn’t comment on it though and Ella started filling out their order cards. Though the place was pretty sceney, it was also considered fairly authentic, and every so often Ella confirmed with him that he meant it when he said he ate everything.

When she was content with their order she placed the card to the side of the table and the server took it when she brought their beers.

“Cheers,” he held his up.

She knocked hers gently against his bottle, her eyes looking into his as she took a small sip. She placed her beer down on the table and placed her elbows there next, leaning forward and making a bridge out of her hands that she could rest her chin on.

“So, Robb,” she said.

He placed his elbows on the table and leaned towards her too. The restaurant really was authentic, which meant that the table was small and they were now quite close together.

“So, Ella,” he returned.

She smiled, her nose scrunching adorably, “What are the rules?”

“The rules?” he asked.

“Of this date,” she told him, “Are we supposed to stick to only first date topics or am I allowed to tell you that the new bookshelves arrived for Cole’s room and I really _would_ like your help securing them to the wall.”

“Hmm,” he narrowed his eyes, holding up both his hands. He lifted one, “Ensuring that your son slash my best friend does not get crushed underneath a bookcase,” and then the other, “Or sticking to topics like your favorite color… tough choice.”

She grinned, “Thank you. I managed to get them upstairs all by myself.”

“I would have done that,” he noted.

“I’m very aware of that,” she assured him, “Maybe later this weekend? I’ll pay you in ginger-molasses cookies.”

“My favorite currency,” he agreed. He ought to have told her that she didn’t need to pay him in anything, but as soon as she mentioned the cookies he was craving them. “So, what is your favorite color? I feel like I should know this…”

She smiled, a blush running up her cheeks as she looked into his eyes, “Blue.”

That same blush landed on his cheeks and he took one of her hands in his, rubbing her knuckle, “Lucky coincidence.”

She let out an embarrassed giggle, and nodded, “Isn’t it just? What’s yours?”

“Jade,” he told her, and she fixed him with a look and he laughed, “Okay, okay. You’re right I’m just saying that. It’s always been blue too, actually. Navy.”

Those eyes of hers had converted him though, not that he could tell her that for fear of sounding like a total sap.

The server came back and brought them some edamame and disappeared without a word.

They talked a bit about their weeks and told each other more about their Thanksgivings. When the server came back and delivered their first bit of seafood he looked at Ella curiously. It looked cooked which he had not been expecting.

“Eel,” she told him.

He held his fingers to his forehead and said, “Unagi.”

This earned a truly delighted laugh from Ella, “I love that episode. Shireen and I do that to Gendry any time he tries to get us to take self-defense classes.”

He chuckled, “Sansa used to do that to me and Jon, too. Though we always made a big show out of being there to defend her ourselves. Arya is alllll about the Unagi.”

“She sounds pretty fearsome, from everything you’ve said,” Ella told him.

“She is,” he told her fondly, “She’s actually teaching self-defense classes there. Braavos has gotten pretty unsafe in recent years.”

“I’m surprised you’re comfortable with her being there,” Ella told him.

“Oh, I’m definitely not,” he agreed and shrugged, “But she’s twenty-six. There’s not much I can really do about that except lecture her, and I think that does more harm than good at this point.”

Ella smiled, “I envy that. A lecture usually has me cowering in a corner.” Then looked at him and shrugged, “But I’m working on it.”

“Is it cheesy if we toast to _working on it_? I feel like that’s been my mantra lately,” he admitted.

She lifted her beer and said, “It might be, but it’s mine too.”

He cheersed her and then she took a slice of eel and cut off a bite and popped it into her mouth. She smiled as she chewed and he took a bite as well. The texture wasn’t exactly what he was expecting, but overall it reminded him of scallops. She glanced at him and he nodded in approval as he swallowed.

She took a sip of beer after hers and he pointed his bottle at her.

“Will you be offended if I say I’m surprised you ordered that?” he asked.

She looked at the bottle and tilted her head back and forth, “No, not at all. I _never_ drink any beer other than this and only when I’m eating sushi. I’ve never found a wine I like with it. Do you like it? You usually go darker right?”

“Usually,” he agreed, “But it works really well with it.”

The server appeared with something else that looked like tuna sashimi and he dug in immediately. It was his favorite, the clean taste of it. Whenever he went to a steakhouse for work he always ordered tuna tartare, never having had much of a taste for the heavier steak tartare they all touted.

This was some of the best he’d ever had, and he looked at her, “How many of these did you order?”

“Two,” she smiled, “Have at it. When the bonito gets here though expect some competition.”

He had no idea what bonito was but he agreed and took another piece of tuna. She was still working on her eel.

Soon their little table was full of plates and when he tried the bonito he immediately asked the server for another order. They also had octopus, salmon, and some sort of fried confection that Ella insisted would change his life.

“So,” he said, after they’d both made their plates, “I have something to tell you.” She stopped eating and set her chopsticks down, her body tensed ever so slightly. “It’s nothing bad… well I shouldn’t say that. _I_ don’t think it’s bad, but it’s kind of weird.”

“I am quite literally stuck on the edge of my seat,” she informed him.

He grinned briefly and then he looked over her face. There was nothing of the man his Dad had told him about to be found in her. Not an ounce of self-indulgence or brashness. And yet, what his Dad had told him of her mother, it sounded like from her she’d been gifted her face and nothing else. He had no idea how the woman sitting in front of him had come to be who she was.

“So over Thanksgiving,” he opened, “I was talking to my Dad, about you,” she opened her mouth and he said, “That’s not the weird part,” she smiled at that and he went on, “He told me once he knew your maiden name, that he and your father were friends. _Best_ friends actually. When they were younger than us.”

“What?” she asked, shaking her head, “No.”

He knew she wasn’t actually arguing with him, just processing that very strange fact.

“I… actually… was named for him,” he ripped off the next band-aid.

“Oh,” she said, her eyes looking over him, “Why – they were friends when they were younger than us. What happened?”

Robb shook his head, “He wouldn’t say.”

She nodded, “I can guess.”

“If it makes you feel better, I think my Dad feels bad about his part in it,” he told her, “You know I wouldn’t just assume that it was all your father.”

She shook her head, “Trust me. My father was very capable.”

“You never talk about him,” he noted.

“There’s very little to say,” she shrugged. He looked at her and she amended, “There’s very little worth mentioning.”

“I never knew him, and I have no doubt that he didn’t deserve to be your father,” he told her honestly, because anyone who could make her sound like that was irredeemable in his eyes. “But I know _my_ Dad. I know what he demands of others. Who _he_ is. And that means that whoever your father was, the man you knew, wasn’t the whole story. Because they may have fallen out, but they were brothers before that.”

She smiled sadly at that and nodded, “Then he got the best of him.” Then looked at him, “Does…”

“You can ask me anything,” he reminded her.

“Does he think I’m like him?” she asked. “Your Dad, I mean.”

“No,” he promised, looking her deeply in the eyes, “Absolutely not. You should have seen him when Wes showed him the blanket you made him.”

She smiled then, a grateful, heartbreaking smile and it beckoned one of his own because she had been worried that his Dad would write her off, because she cared about what his Dad thought about her, because she cared about him.

Ella took a deep breath and then asked, “Do you think if I ever met him… he would tell me about him? Not why they fell out, not if he didn’t want to, but how they became friends. Who he was before… me.” 

He nodded, “Yeah _when_ you meet him, he’ll tell you anything you want to know. In fact, you can have his number and call him yourself if you don’t want to wait.”

“That’s okay,” she grinned, her eyes a little starry, “I don’t mind waiting.”

His insides melted at that look and he moved his leg under the table until it could brush against hers. Her calf rubbed against his and the table suddenly felt too small and too large all at once.

“So important question for you,” he said. She raised an eyebrow and he asked, “Did you really not read the texts or listen to the voicemails?”

Her eyes went wide and then her face broke into a smile, “I did not listen to the voicemails. I deleted them _immediately_ as I promised Jon I would. I didn’t read the texts except to scan very quickly to see that you’d gotten home.” She tilted her head to the side, “Why? What did they say?”

He took a sip of beer, shaking his head, “Absolutely _not_.”

Her eyes glimmered and she reached one of her hands out and stroked the underside of his wrist with soft, gentle fingers.

“Don’t,” he pleaded.

“Why not?” she asked.

“Because I’ll give you anything if you keep doing that,” he admitted.

“This?” she asked, the teasing gone from her voice, replaced with a soft surprise.

“You have no idea what you do to me,” he told her, because it might be embarrassing to admit but he’d take a little embarrassment if it rid her of insecurity.

“I’m happy I’m not alone,” she told him.

He wanted to say a lot to that. Too much to that. He wanted to tell her that he hadn’t felt alone since they day he’d met her. That there was an understanding between them so deep that he couldn’t explain, he couldn’t point to, but that he could feel more acutely than she could possibly imagine. He wanted to tell her that his little something, the little something he tried to do for himself every day, always involved her.

But it was a lot for a first date, over some half-eaten sushi in a crowded restaurant. And like her he could wait, feeling confident that there would be time for more confessions yet.

So, he slid his arm back and took hold of her hand and pressed a kiss to her knuckles.

They continued their dinner and talked about a hundred different things. As he’d told Gilly, his nerves went away entirely sitting there with her, once they’d settled into the understanding that this was just another conversation between them. Not the first, not the last, not the most poignant or crucial, but important all the same. As each of them were.

He remembered once that his Mom had told him she and his Dad had built their love brick by brick. Not for the first time he felt as though another brick was being laid down now. A foundation, if nothing else. A promise of a well-made structure that would one day stand all on its own.

She tried to make him let her pay but in a half-hearted way that suggested she knew a lost cause when she saw it. He helped her into her coat and when her fingers grasped his he pressed a kiss under her jaw line, breathing in her sweet smell and delighting in the subtle jump of her pulse.

It was nice to know that he wasn’t alone.

When they left the restaurant it was without thought that he pulled her against him, and she settled there easily as though it was perfectly right that he should do so.

He walked her to her side of the car and opened the door and she climbed inside. She glanced at him when he didn’t close the door, her eyes growing wider when he stepped closer to her.

And then she was half in and half out of the car, having closed the distance between them and wrapped her arms around his neck, her lips pressing to his. He kissed her back deeply, his knuckles brushing against her soft cheek as he held her around the waist with his other hand.

He lowered her back against the seat, releasing her waist so that he could move his hand up her arm to her neck.

She pulled away and he wasn’t ready, so he kissed her again and she sighed into his mouth, her tongue slipping against his.

When he was terrified of well and truly losing himself, he released her lips and leaned his forehead against hers.

“Ella,” he said.

“Hmm?” she asked, her nose rubbing against his.

He grinned, “I think we should go out on a second date.”

“Right now?” she teased.

“No,” he chuckled, “Just in life. But soon.” He looked at her as her eyes opened, “Very, very soon.”

“Well,” one of her hands brushed his hair back, “It’s not a _date_ but… I was sort of hoping we’d all spend some time together this weekend.”

“We were all hoping that,” he exulted, the symmetry of it all was still such a happy wonder.

“Like a lot of time together,” she amended.

“A lot a lot,” he agreed.

“And yes,” she said, “To the date. In case my answer wasn’t painfully obvious.”

He pressed his lips to hers briefly and then stepped away while he could still walk and closed her door. Taking a deep breath he walked to the driver’s seat and opened up and climbed in.

Traffic was lighter than it had been on the way to the restaurant and he started the conversation, knowing that she wouldn’t.

“Oh,” she said as they were at a red light, “Can we talk about something?”

“What’s up, buttercup?” he asked her as she often asked the boys.

Though his eyes were on the road he could hear her smile when she told him, “Well the boys have been _really_ on me about this whole sleepover thing. They can’t seem to get it out of their heads.”

“Yeah, they were asking me about it too,” he agreed. “What do you think?”

“I don’t know,” she told him, “They did fine the night Brynden was in the hospital but that was sort of a special circumstance. Aren’t they kind of young for sleepovers?”

“I don’t know,” he admitted, “I know Lya’s had one or two. My honest opinion?”

“Preferably,” she noted.

“I think they are both so comfortable in our houses, with each other, and us, that it’d be fine,” he told her.

“Yeah,” she said, “I think you’re right. So maybe next weekend. We try.”

“Alright,” he said, feeling the weirdest feeling in his stomach.

It wasn’t like they didn’t talk about the boys. So much of their conversations were about them. They gave each other advice and support and laughed at the silly things the weird, wonderful children they were raising had done. They discussed who should come on playdates and the snacks they couldn’t get enough of.

But that was different.

They’d just made a parenting decision _together_. It was sort of necessary to have it be together since it involved both of their sons, but it still felt strange. In that it didn’t feel strange at all.

“I think we should flip a coin,” she told him.

“For what?” he asked.

“For who gets to host,” she noted, and he could feel her gaze on him.

“That sounds… fair,” he said.

“Did you want to say _stupid_?” she asked.

He chuckled, “Of course not. Well only a little, anyway.”

She giggled at that and before he knew it he was heading down her driveway entirely too soon for his liking. When he got to the end of it he parked his car. And then turned it off.

He turned in his seat to look at her and found her already looking at him.

“I had a lovely time,” she told him.

“So did I,” he told her.

One of her cheeks was against the seat and he reached out and stroked the other one, his fingers finding her silky hair.

“It felt like a first date,” she told him, “In the best ways. And not in all the best ways too.” She then closed her eyes, “You’re the only person in the world who I speak like this to.”

He swiped his thumb across her cheek, “How are you speaking to me?”

Her eyes opened and she told him softly, “Entirely truthfully.”

He closed the distance them and took her lips in his. This kiss was soft, slow and deep, and he felt it everywhere in his body.

Her fingers stroked his hair and then her lips were sucking on his bottom one and it wasn’t slow anymore. When she broke away for air he kissed her cheek and her jaw and down into the warmth of her neck. Her head tilted back, exposing her throat to him and he kissed across it, behind her ear. She shivered against him and he let his teeth graze it, delighting in the way she grasped onto his arms.

He moved his hand underneath her coat and grasped her tiny waist as she tilted her head to the side and kissed him once again. Her tongue was in his mouth and then his hand was moving down her, squeezing her hip and moving down her thigh, taking hold of it in his hand.

By the time he realized his hand was underneath her dress he was moving it higher still and she wasn’t stopping him. He knew they couldn’t do everything in his car parked in her driveway but his hand kept inching up because she wasn’t stopping him.

His fingers touched lace and he groaned into her mouth and she gasped into his.

“Sorry,” he said against her lips.

She shook her head and kissed him and though he knew it was a rejection it tasted sweet all the same. He retracted his hand from underneath her dress and wrapped it around her back, holding her close to him.

Ella kissed him deeper then and it went on like this. It was always him, who inched them further, her who stopped it even as she pulled him close.

When his hand was close to her breast though he stopped himself and broke their kiss, “You turn me into a fucking teenager.”

She smiled, “How do you mean?”

“Well, in a lot of ways,” he admitted, “But I haven’t made out in a car like this since I was a teenager.”

She laughed, “I didn’t even make out in a car like this when I _was_ a teenager.”

“Goody-goody,” he said, whispering against her lips, “Smarty pants.”

She smiled against his and then kissed him again.

“I should get inside,” she said, as though just realizing it.

“If you want,” he agreed.

She grinned slyly, “What I want and what I should do are entirely different.”

“But you are…,” he started and she glanced at him, “Tempted?”

She laughed, “I am very tempted.” Then wrapped her arms around his neck, “You are very tempting.”

He kissed her softly, “Just wanted to make sure.”

“Wasn’t it obvious?” she wondered.

“I just don’t want to… impose my feelings on you,” he admitted. “You know or pressure you, so you’ve got to just keep being entirely truthful with me. Because I’ll go whatever pace you want.”

“I knew that,” she assured him, and then reassured him still, “But it’s really nice to hear anyway.”

He smiled at her and then pulled away, unbuckling his seatbelt. He got out of the car and walked around to her side and opened the door.

“You might have to help me,” she grinned, “I’m not entirely sure my legs aren’t made of jell-o.”

He chuckled and helped her out of the car and they walked up her steps hand in hand. Though they’d just made out for the better part of a half hour, he couldn’t help but feel nerves in his stomach as they got to the front door.

“So tomorrow?” he asked.

“Tomorrow,” she agreed.

“And we’re still not telling them, right?” he asked.

She shrugged, “I think maybe for now yes? I don’t know… does it bother you?”

“If Wes asks I don’t feel comfortable lying,” he told her, “Or Cole for that matter. But for now, I’m okay with not going out of our way to tell them.”

She thought about that for a moment and nodded, “I feel the same way. I wouldn’t want you to lie if they asked. I… I wouldn’t want you to lie, because I wouldn’t want you to but… I wouldn’t want them to learn to distrust their instincts.”

It didn’t take a genius to know that she’d been made to question her own at one point or another. He knew that the lessons you learned when you were young had a way of sticking with you always. He never wanted to do anything that would stick with Wes in a way that would make his stomach clench when he was older. He’d never want to do that to Cole either.

He took her cheeks in his hands and pressed a kiss to her forehead. She held his wrist gently, her lips kissing the underside.

“I’ll see you tomorrow,” he said, “You gorgeous, gorgeous woman.”

He felt her smile as her cheekbones raised underneath his palms, “Goodnight, you gorgeous, gorgeous man.”

Her eyes looked up into his and though he was loathe to let her go, he had no apprehension about it. It was the strangest feeling, knowing that he’d sleep soundly tonight. Because in the morning she’d open the door, and she’d look at him as she was now, and they’d lay another brick on top of this one.


	20. Chapter 20

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> sooo you all *did* want this to descend into fluff, right?? asking for a friend..
> 
> also I can't believe this is already at ch 20? I feel like I have sooo much story left so I hope you all are with me for the long haul!
> 
> Ohh also, if you haven't listened to Ruth B.'s "If this is love" I highly recommend both as a song and as a MOOD for this story.

Myrcella walked down the hall of Robb’s upstairs until she got to Wes’ door. Ever so quietly she turned the knob and poked her head in.

She had expected to hear giggling but it was silent in the room. Only Grey Wind’s head perked up when she came in, and then, seeing it was her gave a lazy little sigh and flopped back down so that his head could rest against Wes’ legs.

Wes and Cole had opted to share Wes’ bed for their sleepover, wanting to get in every ounce of time together. The pair of them couldn’t sleep more differently, with her son cocooned in the blankets and Wes having kicked out of them entirely.

Confident that they were well and truly asleep she stepped inside for a moment. Their faces couldn’t be more different but they had similar long lashes that kissed the tops of their cheeks. Wes’ face was the picture of calm, a perfect contrast to Cole’s typical look of grim determination – fiercer in sleep than anywhere else.

It was normal, that sort of painful surge of power in her heart when she looked at Cole, and she’d come to recognize it with Wes, too, but even still the sight of them together, happy and asleep and safe brought a nearly painful joy along with it.

Not wanting to risk disturbing them, she headed for the door and closed it gently before walking back down the hall and downstairs.

She walked into the living room and was hit by another surge as she saw Robb sitting on his couch. He was typing something on his phone but he looked up at her as she walked in and set it down immediately.

“We win,” she informed him.

He grinned, “They’re both out?”

“Down for the count,” she confirmed.

“And after all that talk of staying up _all night_ too,” Robb shook his head.

She smiled and walked towards where he was sitting. Her intention to sit next to him was interrupted when he pulled her towards him as soon as she was within reach. Like he’d been waiting for her, calculating the exact distance until she could be in his grasp.

He pulled her between his legs, and looked up at her, “Will you stay for a while?”

She nodded, smiling at him when his face took on a look of relief, “For a while.”

His curls were getting long and she brushed them back from his face. Robb’s eyes closed when she did and she felt a warmth through her whole body as she kissed his forehead. His eyes stayed closed as he took in a deep, calming breath and then she could feel his hands wandering the expanse of her back.

In the beginning, she had almost taken his beauty for granted. He was so handsome that it was almost not worth mentioning, though everyone else did. But as she’d let herself feel the things he beckoned from her, it had become impossible to ignore.

When she was this close to him though, it wasn’t the slopes of his cheekbones or his jawline or his perfect lips, that overwhelmed her the most. It was this, this feeling, his hands on her, the warmth that had been there between them from the start translating itself into a new language all their own.

She kissed his temple next, and then his cheek, her fingers stroking through his soft hair as he nuzzled against her chest.

His hands pulled her down, until she was seated on one of his legs. One of his arms wrapped around her back, holding her secure and the fingers of the other pressed gently against her cheek, his thumb underneath her chin.

It hurt to be looked at the way he was looking at her now. But it was a good hurt, the way everything was with him. That flexing of muscles that had once been in such perfect shape and had dulled from lack of use.

She was the one to kiss him, but his response told her he’d only have lasted another few seconds without leaning in.

His lips were soft and attentive even with a great force of want behind them. She could feel it, when they were together like this, how badly he wanted her, how much restraint he was employing, and her own desire was beckoned by those contradictions in equal measure. The one egging on the other.

She opened her mouth to his and he kissed her deeply, dipping her backwards. His arm felt so strong around her and she took his cheeks in her hands, deepening the kiss further still.

He groaned into her mouth and then she was on her back on the couch and he was on top of her and it should have hurt but she just wanted him closer and closer.

Robb must have felt the same because he was between her legs in the next moment and his head was buried in her neck.

“ _Robb,_ ” she shivered in pleasure when he kissed a spot behind her ear.

He kissed down her neck to the part of her chest exposed by her sweater and she felt one of his large warm hands underneath the hem of it, moving from her waist to her ribs. Her hips rose off the couch desperately and his other hand was there, taking hold her thigh and pulling it against him.

She felt a flood of pleasure and she let out a moan and his eyes were wild when they snapped up to hers before his lips descended on her again.

Her fingers were now tugging on his hair and if it hurt he wasn’t complaining as his tongue slipped against hers, his hands traveling her body in the most delicious pattern.

He kissed her cheek and over to her ear and asked, “Do you want to go upstairs?”

“Yes,” she breathed out before she could stop herself. He looked at her and there was surprise mixed with desire and she realized what she’d just agreed to and said, “No.”

And his reaction was proof that he was unlike any other man when he smiled in amusement.

“There’s one more possible answer,” he teased, rubbing his nose gently against hers, “And if you guess it right I’ll give you a prize.”

She giggled and felt him against her when she did. It should have been embarrassing, the way she was wrapped around him. She looked like a koala bear. And yet it wasn’t, because it was him and every part of him seemed to enjoy it.

Even still she lowered her legs to the couch and leaned her head back against it, looking up at him.

“I’m sorry,” she sighed, “I want to. I… well it _is_ obvious that I want to, right?”

He smiled down at her, “There have been some hints.”

She giggled and he pressed a kiss to her laughing lips.

Myrcella pushed his hair back from his face and looked up at him, “It’s just with the boys right upstairs…”

He nodded, “You’re right, I shouldn’t have asked.”

“No,” she argued, taking both of his cheeks in her hands, “That was a _very_ good thought. One I hope you’ll have again very soon…”

“I can guarantee you I will,” he joked.

He got off of her and sat up and then pulled her with him until she was on her knees, her body pressed against his.

“Will you still stay?” he asked her.

“You want me to?” she wondered.

“Of course, I want you to,” he agreed, “Do you remember that whooole part of our relationship before a few weeks ago where we didn’t even kiss a little bit? I was a pretty big fan of that, too.” She smiled and his eyes went wide, “Not that I want the kissing part to stop.”

She kissed him briefly and settled down next to him, her legs across his lap. His arms wrapped around her and she leaned her cheek against the couch and looked up at him.

He was looking at her already, intently but tentatively too. As though he was focusing very hard on something he wanted to say, but even harder on not saying it.

“What is it?” she asked.

“Can we talk about it?” he asked. “Sex, I mean. I don’t want to make you uncomfortable.”

“We can talk about it,” she said, because he made all the uncomfortable things comfortable.

“I just know that you’ve said you haven’t dated anyone…,” he prompted, and she blushed, knowing where this question was going. “And I wasn’t sure if you meant you hadn’t been in a relationship or if you hadn’t been with anyone since.”

She could feel the blush on her cheeks but she pushed through it, “I… have not dated anyone and apart from the most embarrassing one night stand a couple years ago I haven’t been with anyone since.”

He nodded, “I am actively suppressing the urge to ask to hear that story.”

She laughed, “Oh no, you will never hear that story.”

He smirked, “Fair enough.”

“What about you?” she asked.

To her surprise his cheeks colored and she pulled back a little more so that she could look at him fully.

“I’ve had a few one night stands over the past couple of years,” he confirmed and then looked at her, “Not a _ton_ , but more than you, and more than I’m proud of.”

“Well, don’t be ashamed on my account,” she pleaded. “You’re young… that’s normal.”

“Older than you,” he noted.

She grinned and shrugged, “But that was never me. I had boyfriends before Trystane but I’d only slept with one of them and it was just something that never appealed to me. But _I’m_ the weird one here.”

“You are not weird,” he told her. “I think a lot of people feel the way you do, you know, requiring feeling something deeper, but they sleep around anyway because they feel like it’s what they’re supposed to do. I think it’s cool you never did that – if you’d _wanted_ to and didn’t because you felt like you shouldn’t that’d be a different story.”

She wondered then if there was a part of herself she could show to him that he wouldn’t make okay. In the back of her mind she kept expecting there to be, but every piece she revealed, those bits of herself that snagged in her mind, he smoothed for her, as though everything was perfectly in its place.

“I feel it for you,” she confessed then. His eyes looked into hers, “That something deeper.”

“I feel it for you,” he told her, his hand cupped her cheek, holding her gently but purposefully, “And hearing that means so much to me. You don’t know how much. And when you’re ready, that will mean a lot to me, too, but I don’t want you to rush yourself because I am not going _anywhere_.”

“It’s clever that,” she teased, so that she wouldn’t start to cry like a baby. “Because how do you _not_ sleep with the man who says that?”

He chuckled and she closed the distance between them and pressed a kiss to his lips. It was a long, lingering kiss, that she hoped conveyed the seriousness of what she’d felt. He kissed her back like it did, holding her like she was a rare, precious thing.

“I will say though,” he said when they parted, “That you have superhuman levels of restraint.”

“Quite full of yourself, aren’t you?” she teased.

He let out a surprised chuckle, his nose scrunching in that adorable way of his, “No not me, you ninny. I just meant it’s been over five years.”

“Don’t make fun of me,” she half-pleaded, half-teased.

She got more than enough of it from Arianne and Margaery and Shireen.

“I’m not,” he told her more earnestly than her tone required. “It’s just… I’m sorry I’m being a total guy about it, it’s just a lot of time without contact.”

“Well, you are a total guy,” she pointed out, but allowed, “And it is, but it’s not like I haven’t had an orgasm in five years.”

His eyes closed and he leaned his forehead against hers, “Intellectually I knew that but realistically I need three to five business days to recover from the implication.”

She had never seen him so flustered. It was adorable, and made her feel almost powerful.

“The implication that what?” she asked, touching her lips to his cheek before hovering over his ear, “That I touch myself?”

His hands gripped her and he nodded against her, “Yes.” Then chuckled and shook his head, “You turn me into a fucking teenager.” He looked at her, his eyes cloudy with desire, “It’s just a very pretty picture.”

“I think about you,” she found herself saying.

His face crumbled, making the embarrassment worthwhile and then he groaned and kissed her ardently. She kissed him back and he pulled her against him again, until she was straddling him.

She could feel him hard beneath her and her restraint slipped as she brushed herself against him. A flood of pleasure went through her body and his kissed turned almost brutal, his hands tangling in her hair.

“Ella,” he pleaded in a whimper, his forehead against his, “Seven hells.”

“I’m sorry,” she apologized, though she wasn’t sure for what.

He chuckled in pain, letting out a shaky breath, “By the gods I want you.” He looked at her then and she let out a whimper, feeling the desire radiating off of him. “The next time you touch yourself,” he said, “Think about how much I want to be the one doing it.”

Her mouth went dry and she found herself nodding, agreeing.

He looked at her curiously, “Are you going to do it tonight?” She nodded again. “As soon as you get home?” She nodded again. There was no point in denying it. He groaned in satisfaction, “Then that is what I’ll be thinking about.”

“Robb,” she pleaded.

He nodded and kissed her gently and then pulled away, “Are you okay to drive?”

“Yes,” she promised.

He grinned with cloudy eyes and shook his head, “I don’t want you to leave but…”

She nodded and got off of his lap. He sat for a moment longer before standing up too and following her to the door.

She didn’t bother turning around when they got to it because she knew he’d walk her to her car.

“Do you still want to take them to the movies tomorrow?” she asked.

He nodded, “Yeah I was thinking of getting tickets to the 11 AM. It’ll end in time for lunch and then nap.”

It was one of her favorite things about him. How much of a Dad he was. The way it permeated every part of him so that he could switch gears so easily. Being a Dad was his default setting, as being a Mom was hers, so when he recalibrated that is where he fell back to easily, the pieces sliding right into place.

“That’s perfect,” she agreed.

“Will you meet us there, or should we pick you up?” he wondered.

“Will you pick me up?” she asked.

“10:30?” he agreed.

“Perfect,” she confirmed.

“Think they’ll let me sit next to you?” he asked her.

She giggled and shook her head, “I wouldn’t bet on it.”

“You’re too adored for my own good,” he sighed.

“Hey,” she said, “My phone will be on all night so if he has a nightmare or if he needs me just call.”

Though Cole had been sleeping perfectly soundly when she’d seen him, it could turn very quickly into violent cries. He’d been so excited all week for the sleepover, but it was his first one and she knew that as comfortable as he was at Wes and Robb’s that it could still be scary to wake up in a house that wasn’t your own.

“If he needs you, I promise you I will call,” he agreed.

“But…,” she said out loud since he hadn’t.

He smiled briefly, tucking some hair behind her ear, “But if he has a bad dream, I can handle it. I’d like to handle it.”

She shook her head, “You shouldn’t be woken up, some nights he doesn’t fall back asleep for an hour.”

“It won’t be the first time I’ve been woken up,” he noted, “And it won’t be the last.”

“That’s different,” she argued.

He fixed her with a look, “If Wes was at _your_ house and he woke up in the middle of the night, you’d stay up with him, and probably sing him a song, and bake him muffins and knit him a sweater.”

She laughed, and teased, “Well not a _whole_ sweater.”

He grinned at her but his eyes were serious, “I’d like you to trust that Cole will be alright with me –“

“I do-,” she started.

“And,” he continued pointedly, “I’d like you to trust that I would just as happily stay up with Cole as you would with Wes. Or I would with Wes, for that matter. I love him, Ella. You have to know that.”

She did know that, even still hearing it made her heart ache. Cole loved Robb so much, he looked up to him and idolized him, and he was so confident around him, like he knew how great he was because Robb never let him forget.

“I do know that,” she promised, “And it,” she shook her head, “There aren’t words.”

He tilted her face to his and kissed her gently, “We’ll see you tomorrow morning. Text me when you get home, please?”

“I will,” she promised.

He opened her door for her and she settled in to her seat.

“Oh, and Ella?” he asked in her ear, before pressing a kiss to the spot behind it, “Remember I’ll be thinking of you.”

***

His room was filled with the grey light of early morning when he heard his door open.

It was followed by giggles and _shhs_ and more giggles and he did his best to pretend he was still sleeping, burying his face in the pillow so that his smile wouldn’t ruin their fun.

“ATTACK,” Wes, the commander, called.

“AHHHHH,” Cole, a loyal bannerman, charged.

“Oooof,” he groaned as two little bodies hurled themselves at him. Then in a monster voice said, “WHOOO DARES DISTURB MY SLUMBER?”

“We do!” they shouted gleefully.

He picked up one little body and hurled it across the bed and then the other, their shrieks of laughter better than any alarm clock. Grey Wind was barking at him to be careful as Wes and Cole were presenting themselves to be tossed again.

He could still remember his Dad doing this to him and Jon and Theon. Even Sansa had enjoyed it, as he was always gentler with her than he was with them. His Dad had seemed like such a giant to them all, and he was sure Jon, who’d never known his father, and Theon, who had never liked his, could still remember it just as acutely.

When they had been sufficiently roughhoused he fell back against the pillows and pretended to go back to sleep. He felt a finger tapping his chest and opened his eyes to see two adorable faces, one on either side of him looking at him.

“What are you guys still doing here?” he asked them.

“Get up Daddy,” Wes ordered, knowing this game very well.

“It’s Saturday,” he reminded them.

“Get up, Robb!” Cole giggled. “IT’S SATURDAY.”

“IT’S SATURDAY?” he asked.

“IT’S SATURDAY,” they shouted at him.

“Get up, get up, get up,” he ordered, “We have things to do, people to see.”

“We’re up Daddy!” Wes grinned.

“Oh right,” he agreed, “Get me up then.”

They both took one of his hands and tugged him. He sat up and then there was a bit of chaos when they both tried to pull him off their side of the bed. They all got out eventually and Wes wrapped his arms around his leg.

“How’d you boys do?” he asked them both.

“We did great!” Cole answered for them both. “We should have sleepovers ALL THE TIME.”

“Yeah!” Wes agreed. “Foreverandever.”

“And ever,” Cole repeated, the two of them descending into giggles as though this was a private joke between them.

He chuckled, but said truthfully, “I’m glad everyone slept well. Who’s hungry?”

“Meeee,” they both agreed.

“What do we want to eat?” he asked.

“Robb. Eggs.” Cole started stomping his feet.

“Daddy. Eggs.” Wes took up the war cry.

“ROBB EGGS OOH HA HA HA,” Cole switched it up, eliciting Wes’ giggle.

“It’s good you two found each other,” he teased, though he meant it. “Eggs it is. And I’m thinking a smoothie.”

“Ooooh yeah yummy,” Wes agreed.

Cole seemed to think this was a great idea and the three of them went downstairs, Grey Wind following behind.

Wes went to feed Grey Wind and Robb held Cole up to the sink so that he could fill his waterbowl.

“Should we text your Mommy and tell her how great you did?” he asked.

“Yeah!” Cole agreed, setting the water bowl on the counter, “She’s gonna be SO happy.”

“She is,” he confirmed. He set Cole down on the counter and grabbed him a whisk out of the drawer and handed it to him. “Smile, buddy.”

Cole grinned widely and Robb snapped a picture of him.

He sent it to Ella with a text saying: _Eggs have been demanded on pain of banishment (he did great and slept through the night, I hope you did the same and are still sleeping)_

He was unsurprised to see the typing bubbles appear immediately and she responded: _Look at that devious little face! I’m so glad he slept, did Wes do okay?_

His heart flooded with that rush of warmth he always felt when Ella made it clear, whether intentionally or not, how much Wes meant to her.

_He lead the attack on me this morning and is currently fortifying the troops (feeding Grey Wind). I’d expect another sleepover request pretty much immediately._

She started typing back: _They’ve already requested one, haven’t they?_

He told her: _More than one._

He let Cole down so that he could _very carefully,_ as though it was a sacred object, carry the water dish over to where Grey Wind was eating. The boys returned as a pair and both wanted to get up on the counter so he set them up side by side.

They chose the fruit to put in the smoothie – peach, strawberry, banana and blueberry – and agreed that orange _and_ cranberry juice was the way to go. He dumped all of it into the blender and added some of the healthy, no sugar, no food coloring yogurt that he could only ever sneak into Wes this way, and some ice and then blended it all up.

He poured them all glasses of it and got the boys the wide straws Gilly had gotten for them for exactly this purpose.

“Yummmmmmm,” Cole said.

“Madfkammm,” Wes agreed.

He picked up his phone again, which was now filled with pictures of the two of them, and told them to smile. Without conferring they both threw their arms around each other’s shoulders and held up their smoothies, grinning widely.

He snapped a picture and sent it to Ella. After thinking about it for a moment he sent it to Sansa too, saying: _First sleepover was a success_

She started typing back immediately and said: _I’m coming to steal them both. I’ll speak of you and Ella fondly._

He smirked and typed back: _Don’t be surprised when Lya goes missing, then. I’d check Ella’s house first but you didn’t hear it from me._

Content that the smoothies would hold the boys over he focused on making coffee first. He then checked his email to make sure nothing urgent had come up overnight, which it thankfully hadn’t. Though a call was requested for that afternoon. He typed back the hours he was available – only during Wes’ naptime – and put his phone down.

He sipped his smoothie as he pulled out everything for the eggs and made them lazily as he listened to Wes and Cole chatter.

It was only seven and they didn’t have to pick up Ella until 10:30 and he glanced outside.

“If it stays dry after breakfast, do you guys want to go to the river path?” he asked, hoping to get them into the fresh air.

“Yeahh,” Wes agreed, and said to Cole, “You can use my scooter and we can RACE!”

“Yeahhh,” Cole agreed.

With that resolved he scooped helpings of the eggs onto three plates and helped them off the counter. The boys went to the table and he brought everything over, going back into the fridge and grabbing the hot sauce for his.

Wes wanted him to ride his bike, too, but when he noted that he wanted to get Grey Wind out for a walk as well, this thought was immediately abandoned as long as he brought the chucker along with him so that they could throw balls for him.

Over breakfast they talked about the movie they were going to see. It was a new animated one and Sansa had assured him that he was going to cry during it but that the boys would love it.

“We get popcorn,” Cole grinned, sipping his smoothie.

“And candy,” Wes agreed.

Cole didn’t seem too concerned about the candy, not having a sweet tooth like Wes or him.

“Does your Mommy like candy?” he asked.

Cole nodded, “She likes the sour gummy candy. With the sour sugar. Gross.”

Robb chuckled, “Hey, that’s _my_ favorite.”

Cole found the fact that he’d judged something he liked _hilarious_ and soon him and Wes were laughing uncontrollably. Robb didn’t necessarily see the humor but it was sort of impossible not to join in with their delighted giggles.

They finished their breakfast and all went upstairs and got dressed and their teeth brushed and then went outside. Once he got their helmets on he lead them to the street where they could ride. He stood on the outside, but traffic was slow this early on a Saturday morning and the street was mostly filled with street traffic. People going for runs or walking their dogs like he was.

It was a brisk out, enough that it along with the exercise whipped color into the boys cheeks, but all attempts at getting them to zip their jackets were rebuffed. He couldn’t blame them, he’d never wanted to either.

When they got back the boys decided to play one of the board games Wes had gotten for his birthday and he got them all set up and made sure they understood the rules and then showered and changed.

He pulled on dark jeans and a blue sweater that that Sansa had bought for him but he’d never worn. It was a quarter-zip, which was a bit too middle-aged banker for him, but Ella had told him the other day when he was wearing a shirt that color that it looked good on him and he’d liked hearing that and had _really_ liked the way she’d looked at him so he decided to wear it.

When he went back downstairs he saw that the boys were very happily occupied so he went into his office and did some work. He hadn’t realized when Brynden was staying there how convenient it was to have him there to discuss ideas with on the fly.

Robb dialed his great-uncle, missing him suddenly.

“You see this bullshit?” Brynden greeted him.

Robb smirked, “I was just looking at it. I’m not crazy, that isn’t what we discussed, right?”

“Absolutely not,” Brynden assured him, “We want these to be functional. From all the research, additional storage is _far_ more important. There’s no garage or storage unit for these tenants.”

“Okay,” Robb agreed, “I’m typing something out let me put you on speaker.”

“What’s going on over there,” Brynden asked.

“Cole slept over last night,” he told him, distractedly as he typed, “Went well. We’re picking up Ella to go to the movies in an hour.”

“Thanks for the invitation,” Brynden noted dramatically.

“You hate kids movies,” he reminded him, “You tried to show Wes The Godfather.”

“Pardon me for trying to instill some culture,” Brynden sighed.

Robb chuckled, “But that’s the other reason I’m calling. You’re not invited to the movies because I’m not dealing with you sighing the whole way through it, but are you free tonight or tomorrow for dinner?”

“It is Saturday night,” Brynden reminded him, “I’m not free and neither should you be.”

Robb rolled his eyes, “Please call Ella and ask her if she feels neglected.”

Brynden chuckled, “It is not enough for that girl not to feel neglected. You should be wooing her. You’re in the wooing stages.”

“Please stop saying woo,” Robb noted as he pressed send on the email. “Just sent it over to you, let me know what you think. I want to make sure I’m remembering it all correctly. Do you think she doesn’t feel wooed?”

“Do you think she feels wooed?” Brynden asked, “Your punctuation is shit, by the way.”

“I don’t know,” he said.

“Well I do, you use dashes like they’re sponsoring you,” Brynden went on. Robb chuckled. “I’m sure you’re making her very happy. Don’t let me make you second guess yourself. I just see the way you two are together and I really think it’s wonderful – Robb I think it’s so wonderful the sight of you with the boys, it really… it’s special, okay? I just want to make sure that the beginnings of your relationship aren’t getting lost in it.”

“Yeah, you’re right,” he said, adding, “I do use dashes too much.”

“Smart ass,” Brynden chuckled into the phone.

Robb grinned, “So tomorrow? Theon may be here to watch the game.”

“I’ll bring some steaks over,” Brynden agreed.

“What are you going to eat?” Robb asked.

“Smart ass,” Brynden said again into the phone. “You’ve got it all straight. You’re a little too _nice_ in it but that can’t be helped.”

Robb read it over, “I am not.”

“You didn’t threaten their livelihoods once, it’s like I’ve taught you nothing,” Brynden lamented.

“You’ve taught me plenty,” Robb pointed out, “Like not to make threats I don’t intend on seeing through. We want to work with them, we wanted to work with them for a reason. They just need to remember that this is being designed for actual people.”

He and Brynden hung up and he went in to check on the boys. Cole was winning the game but didn’t seem to understand exactly how.

“Is it fun at least?” Robb wondered, knowing that some of the newer board games were total duds.

“Yeah!” Wes agreed, “Gilly’s gonna love it.”

The boys finished the game and he got Cole packed up and let Grey Wind out and before too long it was time to get in the car and drive over to pick up Ella.

“Mommy’s gonna be so excited to see us,” Cole informed them.

“You think she missed us?” Wes asked curiously.

“Oh yeah,” Cole confirmed. “De-fin-itely.”

Robb tried to hide his smile at the confidence in his voice, but he had to agree. Though Ella had hopefully enjoyed a bit of alone time, or a _lot_ of alone time a part of him reminded him, he was sure she was looking forward to seeing the boys. And him, he added to himself.

It was getting easier and easier to do now. She was very good at showing him how wanted and appreciated he was.

He pulled down her driveway and before he’d even stopped she’d opened the door. He put down Wes’ window and the boys shouted for her excitedly.

She was grinning at them, trying to answer whatever they were saying though they were both talking at once, and it gave him time to look at her.

She looked gorgeous in a pair of high waisted, loose jeans, a black turtleneck, and ankle boots, her hair piled on top of her head, her trench coat slung over her arm.

Ella opened the door to the passenger seat and greeted them all, “Good morning, boys.”

“Mommy mommy mommy I wanna hug you,” Cole told her.

She turned around, “I want to hug you too, baby,” she then smiled at Wes, “And you too, sweetheart, so I expect biiiiiig hugs when we get there.”

The boys agreed readily and she swiveled back and bucked her seatbelt.

She looked at him, “Is that clear, Stark?”

“How big are we talking?” he asked her.

“BIG,” Cole answered from the backseat.

_BIG_ Ella mouthed at him.

He chuckled and had to touch her so he squeezed her shoulder before restarting his car. It was a short drive to the movie theater and the pre-lunch time hour meant that the parking lot was pretty much deserted.

That was a good thing because Cole and Wes fully tackled Ella onto the pavement. He couldn’t take pictures fast enough of the three of them laughing as their little limbs overpowered her body.

When she got up they all went to walk toward the movie theater.

“Um,” he noted, “Excuse me.”

The three of them stopped in tandem and looked at him.

“I was promised a hug,” he reminded her, “A BIG one if memory serves.”

She grinned and scrunched her nose, “You asked for it.”

Before he could answer her she jumped _at_ him the way Cole would and he caught her to him easily. He squeezed her to him and she wrapped her arms around his neck.

“That sweater looks nice on you,” she told him in his ear.

“Forgive me for this,” he pleaded, “I’m doing it for the fans.”

“What- _oohf_ ,” she said as he jumped up once and then laughed as he did it again and again and again, much to the predicted delight of Wes and Cole.

“Now _that’s_ a big hug,” Cole agreed as he set her down.

Ella laughed and took Cole by the hand and Wes grinned up at him and offered him his. Robb took it and the four of them walked into the mall where the movie theater was.

“Can we look at the puppies?” Wes asked.

Robb looked at his watch and saw that they had time, “For a few minutes, but don’t bang on the glass okay?”

Wes nodded and he and Cole ran hand in hand across the hallway over to the pet store.

“Pet stores always make me sort of sad,” Ella told him.

“Me too,” he agreed, “You still thinking of a dog?”

Ella nodded, “Yeah I’m in contact with a few breeders but I’ll wait until the spring though for puppy season. I keep going back and forth between wanting to adopt a calm, older dog that needs a home and a puppy that we can raise from the start.”

“There’s merits to both,” he agreed.

“Yeah,” she agreed. He went to cross to the pet store as well, but she touched her hand to his forearm. It was a soft, quick touch but it stopped him in his tracks all the same. “I wanted to talk to you about something.”

“What’s up, buttercup?” he asked.

He watched as a blush ran up her cheeks, “Well… another sleepover.”

His brow furrowed, “Totally. They did great.”

“Well,” she glanced around, “That’s the thing. I don’t mean for them…”

“You don’t -,” he started and then gulped, trying to fight the smile from coming onto his face, “You don’t?”

She shook her head, her eyes wandering over his face, a slow smile perched on her lips, “No… I was thinking maybe _we_ could have one.”


	21. Chapter 21

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Author's note at the end!

Even as he pulled underneath the carport of the Riverrun Grand Hotel he couldn’t quite believe he was there. The valet who came to take his keys assured him that he was, but it didn’t feel real.

He’d felt in a bit of a daze since Ella had brought it up. After the movie that day, she, Wes and Cole had all been talking about their favorite parts, but he hadn’t been able to follow it. His mind had been only on that look in her eyes, the blush on her cheeks, the simplicity of the request.

A sleepover, for the two of them.

That was always where this thing between them was going to go. He found it embarrassingly challenging to keep his hands off of her when he was around her now, and thankfully, she didn’t seem to feel any desire for him to succeed. It wasn’t just attraction, it was so far beyond that, but even still that was there all the time.

When he thought about it, it was understandable. As much as she said how unguarded she was with him – and he knew that for her, she was – she was still Ella. A planner. She wasn’t going to just give in one night because she wanted to. So the request shouldn’t have dumbfounded him as much as it had.

He’d agreed immediately, because that wasn’t the sort of thing a person said no to. If Myrcella Martell asked you to have a sleepover with her, you said yes. It really was that simple. He wanted her so badly, and every touch between them only exacerbated it. Her lips against his and her waist in his hands and her fingers in his hair.

Above all though was the sweet, brave thing she’d told him last Friday night.

_I feel it for you. That something deeper._

Having feelings for Ella was as natural as it was terrifying. Natural because of who she was. Warm, kind, funny, beautiful, a mesmerizing intersection of virtues. Terrifying because of what had happened – to him, to her, to their sons – but also because falling for anyone was terrifying, and it meant so much to hear her say that she felt it too.

She told him that she was more open with him than she was with anyone, but he was a glutton for it. He devoured every bit of herself that she gave but was never wholly satisfied.

To want someone so completely, everything that they were, was something he hadn’t experienced in years. Something he hadn’t expected to ever experience again.

He’d always imagined that eventually he would date. That maybe there would even be a relationship or two. He knew that a life of solitude was not one he was cut out for necessarily. But he’d never expected to feel this strongly for someone at all, let alone, so soon.

He’d discussed it with Dr. Selmy many times now, and they always came back to the same conclusion. That the exact same reason he had never expected to fall for anyone was why he had fallen so deeply.

After having gone through what he had, his isolation would only be disturbed by someone he might one day fall for completely. Anything else was just a waste of time and energy.

Ella was more than worthy of both, and more.

He had considered suggesting that they spent the night at one of their homes. Wes or Cole could go and stay with someone and they could have the house to themselves. But then he’d thought about what his Uncle Brynden had told him, that it wasn’t enough for Ella not to feel neglected, she had to feel _wooed_.

Wooing was something else he hadn’t done in many years.

He could remember it, the early stages with Jeyne. The flowers and the weekends away, the jewelry she always said was too much but seemed to love anyway. He had been twenty-six and in love for the first time. There had been a lot of it. A newly disposable income all his own and someone to spoil with it.

When she’d had a bad day at work, he’d show up with that overpriced champagne she loved, and they’d drink it right from the bottle as she complained about her boss and her clients and they’d order noodles and spring rolls and eat cross legged on the floor of her apartment.

It had been so easy then to make everything better. It had been so easy then to woo. No commitments, apart from work and her. No fear, no trip wires.

With Ella though, now, it was more challenging. He feared being at her house one evening and being served the champagne that would always remind him of tasting it on Jeyne’s lips. There were restaurants he could never take her to, and he didn’t like the idea of reusing old moves. Not just because he was nearly a decade older, and they felt silly to him now, but because he wanted his and Ella’s relationship to be entirely their own.

And he knew that he was not alone in that minefield.

He’d chosen a newer restaurant for their date, not only because Theon had told him, and Edmure had confirmed, that it was the best date spot in the city, but because he didn’t want to risk pulling up to a restaurant that Ella had been to with Trystane.

They had both already loved and lost in this city, and there were certain streets of it that may as well be crypts for all the ghosts they held.

So, his first suggestion had been to leave it entirely. There were plenty of lovely towns and cities in the Riverlands. The area was written up in all of the travel magazines for its charm and the way the old architecture remained amidst the modernization. They could go somewhere an hour away where he didn’t feel the need to peer around every corner to see what might be lurking behind it.

It was a mark of how much had changed though, truly, that he was relieved when she’d been resistant to that idea. Because he was no longer the sort of man that could pick up and leave for a weekend without a second thought. He had a son, a son he liked to spend as much time with as possible, and though he understood the importance of having he and Ella be something distinct, he didn’t like the idea of them being in competition with that time. And he didn’t like the idea of being an hour or so away should something happen.

Ella, too, had seen the merits of it. A night away, exploring a city together. But she, like him, had a son she adored whom she very rarely spent a night away from and the idea of leaving him and the city he was in entirely didn’t seem to sit right.

And that was something else that was different too.

Everything between them was a conversation. Neither of them had arrived to one another unscathed and it seemed that she was just as committed to gentleness with him as he was to it with her. So, they talked about everything.

At this stage of their lives, neither of them was in a position to be whisked away, and it was so nice to be with someone who not only understood that, but who enjoyed them both being exactly where they were.

It was a different sort of romance, but to him, it was romantic all the same. The things Ella did to show him how much care she took with him and his feelings and his son opened his heart more than any grand gesture might and he hoped that she understood that the swell of emotion behind those grand gestures could be found in every little thing he did.

Because he felt it, that something more, in every bit of himself.

They had compromised, not with one another but with the situation, and decided on a night at a hotel in Riverrun. In truth it was the best hotel in the Riverlands but he’d only ever been to it for functions – weddings and that sort of thing, never to stay, because there was never any reason to. Ella too, thankfully, only had a passing familiarity with it, she’d been for tea once, she’d told him, but it seemed a green zone surrounded by no man’s land.

His stomach churned with nerves as he handed the valet his keys, thanking him and taking the ticket he proffered and placing it in his wallet. Nerves, and excitement, it was important to note to himself. He was getting to spend the night with Ella, the whole night with her. They wouldn’t have to kiss goodbye hurriedly by one of their cars, or sneak into the bathroom, their touches wouldn’t have to be hidden.

He was not so romantic that he hadn’t also thought about sleeping with her. He thought about it often, too often. She drove him crazy and the idea of being naked with her, of being inside her, had made it impossible to sleep the night before.

Robb walked inside the hotel, barely noticing the stonework or the imposing nature of it and walked right to the reception desk. A young, uniformed, man greeted him.

“Hi I’m Robb Stark, I have a reservation for tonight,” he told him.

“Yes, sir,” the man, more a boy than anything else, nodded, “The other guest in your party is waiting for you in the bar.”

That took him by surprise, as he was a few minutes early.

“Did she already check in?” he asked.

The boy blushed, “No, she wasn’t on the reservation.”

Robb nodded, looking at him. He realized that the blush had nothing to do with anything apart from how beautiful Ella was, and he couldn’t blame the kid for it.

“I’ll join her,” he told him, “Can I leave this with you?”

“Of course, sir, the bar is just to the right of the main lobby, through those doors,” the boy said, coming to take his small overnight bag.

Robb thanked him and headed through the lobby and opened the door. His heart stopped when he saw Ella sitting at the bar. Her golden hair was down and tumbled around her shoulders and she wore a navy blue – his favorite – wrap dress that revealed a bit of leg as she crossed one over the other.

He walked over to her and said, “I’m sorry, I never do this, but you’re the most beautiful girl in the place and I’d like to buy you a drink.”

She hadn’t turned to look at him yet and he watched as she waited to gain control over her smile before turning to him. It was with a challenging look in her eye and she pushed a martini glass into his eyeline.

“I’ve already got a drink, handsome,” she purred in the voice of a femme fatale, an elegant brow raised, “So why don’t you just ask what you really want to?”

“Spend the night with me,” he all but growled.

Her jade eyes wandered over his face and she confessed, “I’m not that thirsty anyway.”

He pulled out his wallet and dropped an unknown sum on the bar and took her by the hand. She allowed him to help her off the seat, but he hadn’t moved so her body brushed against his as he did. His hand went to the small of her back, holding her there, and her hand held his lapel gingerly.

“Don’t kiss me until we get to the room,” she pleaded.

“I won’t,” he promised, knowing that once he did, he wouldn’t stop. “We’ve got to get the keys.”

She nodded and her hand moved down his body and then behind her own, taking his hand in hers. Her eyes hadn’t left his once. He pulled her towards the exit and then they were back in the lobby and he was entirely blind to the other guests.

“Hello again sir, miss,” the boy greeted them at the desk.

“Hi,” Ella said brightly as though she hadn’t just seduced him.

Not that he put up much of a fight.

He pulled out his wallet and gave him his credit card and license. He should have left them with him so that this could all be done but he thought they’d actually sit and have a drink. He hadn’t expected her to look like that or look at him like that, though by now he should have.

“Ah yes, Mr. Stark, we have you in our best river view suite,” the boy told him but Ella’s fingers were stroking his palm. “It has a fireplace that we’d be more than happy to come and light for you –“

“I can light it myself, thanks,” he offered ungraciously, all but tapping his foot.

He glanced at Ella and she smiled ruefully at him and he shook his head at her. She was torturing him and she knew it and though he really liked it he knew that putting a stop to it would be even more fun.

“Perfect, and have you stayed with us before?” the boy asked.

“No, we haven’t,” Ella shook her head, “It’s _beautiful_.”

He squeezed her palm and she bit her lip to hide her smile but nothing could quell the humor in her eyes.

“It is the oldest hotel in the Riverlands and boasts impressive views of the city and the river,” the boy told them, “Now I’m sure you all have plans but if you’d like to join us for dinner-“

“We do have plans,” Robb told him, though they didn’t.

“Perfect, well then I should also mention our breakf-,” the boy started.

“Why don’t we just call if we have any questions?” Ella suggested, clearly seeing the fact that the boy’s life was in jeopardy if he were to keep talking for a second longer. “Is that our key?”

“Yes, miss,” the boy agreed.

“Thank you so much,” she smiled at him before holding her hand out for it.

The boy seemed to finally understand the situation they were in and he handed it to her quickly and then came around with their bags. Robb grabbed them both and the boy pointed wordlessly to the elevator.

He placed his hand on the small of Ella’s back and pushed her towards it.

“Robb,” she giggled, “Everyone will know.”

“No one will blame me,” he assured her as he pressed the button for the elevator. His eyes drank her in, “Look at you.”

A blush ran up her cheeks and her eyes were cloudy and he wasn’t sure if she dragged him into the elevator or if he pushed her in but either way they were inside it and he closed the door quickly lest anyone think of joining them in there.

Myrcella Martell was not the sort of woman you felt up in a hotel elevator, so it was with great restraint that he kept his touches to her back and arms, though they got close on a number of occasions to exploring the rest of her.

The elevator doors opened and he was glad there were only four rooms on their floor because it made it easy to find theirs. He shoved the electronic key in and pushed open the door.

“Oh Robb,” she exclaimed when they walked inside, “It’s beautiful.”

“I do not care,” he told her.

She giggled and he caught it on his lips and then that giggle turned into a moan. He dropped their things and made sure the door was closed tightly and then he pulled her body against his.

Ella shoved his suit jacket off of him and it fell to the floor and his hands finally wandered down to grab hold of her ass the way he’d been dying to. Her lips eagerly followed his and when his tongue slipped against hers she sucked on it, making him see stars.

“I want you,” he told her, somewhat unnecessarily and completely desperately, “I want you right now.”

She didn’t say anything, but her hands went to his belt buckle and undid it and then his pants, which were suddenly around his knees.

He was sure the suite had a bed, he had probably read something about it, but there was no way it was closer than the wall, which is what he pushed her up against.

His hands went up her dress and pulled down her underwear and then her legs were in his hands and up around his waist.

He had never touched her and he felt her up against his hard cock, warm and wet and perfect.

“Robb,” she whimpered, “Please.”

He braced her against the wall, holding her bottom with one hand and took himself in his other, guiding himself into her. He groaned as he entered her. It had been a while, too long, since he’d been inside a woman and the last hadn’t held a candle to her.

He thrust into her and felt her clench around him, her arms wrapped around his shoulders, her thighs squeezing his waist. Now fully inside of her his other hand gripped the underside of her thigh and he thrust in again. And again, and again.

She felt so good and her fingers were tugging his hair.

“ _Ella_ ,” he groaned, one of his hands moving up her body, squeezing her breast and then taking her neck in his grasp so that he could tilt her face up to look at him. He was thrusting all the while and she was so wet and warm and tight and her jade eyes flicked to his and – “ _Oh fuck_.”

Ten seconds of bliss as he came – suddenly, without warning and certainly without her – were followed by the absolute dread at what had just happened. He hadn’t even lasted a minute. He had booked him and Myrcella Martell a suite at the nicest hotel in town only to last less than a minute.

“I’m so sorry,” he said into her neck.

“Don’t be sorry,” she urged, the fingers that had just been pulling his hair now stroking it.

“Well now you know I wasn’t lying,” he noted, “You really do turn me into a teenage boy.”

She was silent for a moment, and then he heard her snort, and her small body started shaking in his hands.

“I’m sorry,” she laughed, “It’s…I’m not laughing at you. That was just funny.”

“You have every right to laugh at me,” he pointed out, pulling away from her slightly, so that he could look at her, “I promise I can last longer than that.”

Her face took on an expression of concern, “Of course you can.”

“Don’t do that,” he pleaded, “I really can.”

“I believe you!” she promised.

“You’re so beautiful,” he explained. “And I’ve wanted this for so long –“

“Robb,” she adjusted herself so that she could lean her forehead against his, “You don’t have to explain.”

“But you’re so beautiful,” he told her again.

She smiled against his lips, kissing them gently, “So are you.”

“I couldn’t control myself,” he went on.

“I know,” she smiled, “I liked that.”

“I didn’t give you a chance to come,” he lamented.

“Well,” she said, “If it makes you feel better, it could have gone on a lot longer and I still don’t think I would have come….”

“That does,” he started and then realized what she’d just said, “NOT make me feel better.”

Her eyes scrunched closed, “Okay that sounded so much better in my head.” And then it was her who was kissing him and apologizing, “I’m sorry, I… I wanted – I _want_ you so badly and you felt so good and you…” she gulped, her eyes looking into his, “Turn me on so much. I just think I was nervous.”

“Me too,” he agreed. Her face looked surprised and a _little_ skeptical and he grinned, “Hey, nerves manifest in different ways.”

She giggled but told him earnestly, “It felt really good.”

“I obviously agree,” he noted.

She closed her eyes and smiled but then opened them and looked at him nervously. He saw it then. The femme fatale had been a mask, of course it had. That wasn’t her, and he knew that, but he’d been so blinded by it that he hadn’t even given it thought.

He stroked her cheek, “I’m sorry you were nervous and I didn’t see it.”

“Don’t be,” she told him, “I’m good at hiding those things.”

“Not from me,” he reminded her, “Not usually.”

“I know,” she smiled, “I worked extra hard.”

“Are you nervous now?” he asked.

She looked into his eyes and it was Ella. Sweet, beautiful, cozy Ella, who was so much more dear to him than any mask could ever be.

He pressed a kiss to her forehead and she wrapped her arms around his shoulder and nuzzled her nose against his cheek. Still holding her he turned around and realized that he wasn’t crazy to not have seen a bed because it wasn’t even in this room. There was a couch though so he brought her over to it and settled down with her across his lap.

Though it was embarrassing, and absolutely not how he wanted their first time to go, he was almost glad it had happened because now he could focus entirely on her.

“Will you tell me what you’re nervous about?” he asked.

“It’s silly,” she said, “But I haven’t done this in so long, and I haven’t been naked with someone in so long, not since before Cole. And you’re always so wonderful and complimentary and I can feel how badly you want me but I just… I’m not good at being vulnerable and you make it really easy to be, but being naked with someone is as vulnerable as it gets and I just got in my own head a bit.”

“Yeah,” he nodded, and then shook his head, “It’s not silly, well it’s not silly that you feel that way, I should say. I’m uh… having a hard time trying to figure out how to reassure you without invalidating you.”

“Selmy’s worth every penny,” she told him.

He chuckled and said, “So please just know that is my intention: I do not think you’re silly, because I know that what you see and what I see are two different things. But Ella, I’m not complimentary, I’m just honest. You are… excruciatingly beautiful, and if it isn’t painfully obvious, it’d be difficult for me to want you more than I do.”

She nodded, “It’s just that the last time I cared about a person seeing me naked for the first time, I was barely over twenty. And now I’m twenty-eight and a Mom and…”

She didn’t have to finish the rest. He remembered Jeyne in the months following Wes’ birth. It had taken her longer than she would have liked to lose the weight and there was no amount of reassurance from him that her body was perfect that made her okay with it.

“And your body changed because you grew a human being inside of you?” he suggested. She looked at him and he shook his head, because he wasn’t sure if he’d ever told her this, “Ella, one of the things that makes you most attractive to me is that you’re a Mom. And I’m sure you were stunning then, but I don’t want to date a twenty-year-old… they freak me out with their tik-tok and their crop tops.” She giggled and he smiled but told her, “I trust your judgment when it comes to so many things. So many. But there are a couple, _just a couple,_ that I think we should trust my judgment over yours. Whether to bring a raincoat, for starters.” She giggled again and he pressed a kiss to the warm, pink, apple of her cheek, “And how beautiful and wonderful you are, more importantly.”

She turned her face and caught his lips with hers. He kissed her back but waited, not wanting to steamroll ahead again and miss something important.

So it was her that deepened it, her lips around his bottom one, and then her tongue against it and then his. She was the one to stop it, too.

He was going to suggest that they think about somewhere to go for dinner. That they go talk and take the pressure off of themselves. They were always so comfortable together in conversation, even difficult ones, and some food might help.

That idea died in his mind when Ella looked into his eyes as her fingers went to the tie of her dress and pulled it undone.

He gulped, knowing that in a moment he’d see nearly all of her.

“Are you sure?” he asked.

She nodded, “Look at me,” and then smiled a warm, surprised smile, “I want you to.”

As gently as he was able he pulled her dress open. His mouth went dry at the sight of her and he felt his cock react immediately.

She was so fine and delicate and his fingers felt clumsy against her stubborn perfection.

They started in a place he knew was safe, her collarbone and chest bone. Her skin was soft and warm and he let his fingers move over to her left breast where the pads of them could feel her heartbeat. It was beating steadily.

He looked at her, “You’re not nervous.”

“You make everything okay,” she told him simply, as though it were obvious.

As though she’d thought it to herself so many times that it had become an inarguable truth.

He was afraid of the surge of feeling he had for her then and cowardly hid his face from her, knowing she’d see it there. He pressed a kiss to her shoulder and then her collarbone and then over her heartbeat, down between her breasts.

They were covered in a thin white lace, as delicate as she was, and he looked up at her.

“Can I?” he asked.

She nodded and he unhooked her bra and pulled it off. He had always considered himself an ass man but her breasts were so perfect he was considering converting. Small and soft, he returned his lips to her now bare skin.

All of a sudden it became much easier and he realized she’d leaned back, exposing herself to him. It released an animal in him that he fought very hard to keep under control. He took a breast in his mouth, his tongue licking at her peaked nipple.

“ _Robb_ ,” she whispered and he sucked on it.

Her body was so little and it made it very easy for his free hand to wander all over it with very little effort. In truth he wasn’t even giving it much thought, his hand roaming as though it had a mind of its own.

It went to her bare knee and then up her leg, his thumb moving up her inner thighs. He stopped midway and waited, focusing his attentions on her upper body, which his lips were mapping.

His body released a groan when her legs parted for him and he continued moving his hand up until he got to her center.

He touched her lightly and gritted his teeth when he felt her wetness against his fingers. Stroking his fingers up and down her, he found her pearl with his thumb and her weight became dead in his arm as she gave herself up to him.

“Ella,” he moaned against her skin, “I want you to show me what you like.”

A few moments ago she would have told him that what he was doing felt good. He could tell that it did, but now her hand went to his wrist and she adjusted his hands ever so slightly. He moved it against her and she squeezed his wrist as the quietest whimper he’d ever heard left her lips.

He looked up at her and was thankful he’d already come because the sight of her now would have beckoned it just as quickly.

He watched her face as his hand moved against her, his fingers in her shallowly, the side of his thumb against her pearl. She was nearly silent, the mask was gone now. There was no overly emphatic moaning, or words, there was nothing performative about her now and she, this, _her_ was so much more irresistible.

Her brow knit and her bottom lip fled the top one and he could feel why as he touched her. She was so close and he just kept doing what he was doing, afraid if he changed even the slightest bit he’d ruin it.

And then he felt it and saw it and it felt a little like his world had been black and white and she brought him into technicolor as she released a small, surprised gasp and her body rolled against his hand and he felt every last bit of tension release from her.

Her chest was rising and falling quickly and he moved his hand back up her body and felt her heart beating a mile a minute.

He looked at her as her eyes were opening, “Can you do it again?”

“I will touch you all night if you let me,” he told her honestly, his hand wandering back down her body.

She caught his wrist and shook her head, “Not what I meant.”

He leaned forward and caught her lips as her meaning sunk in. She kissed him back eagerly.

“Is there a bed in this dump?” he asked.

She laughed and pointed, “I think it’s back there.” Then pressed a kiss to his lips and hopped off of him. “I’ll race you.”

She had a head start, partially because she was standing up and partially because he was braindead, but he hopped off the couch too and followed her into the bedroom. He caught up to her just as they got to the bed and tackled her onto it.

She was laughing but he rolled her on top of him, wanting her to be in control. She kissed his lips and he kissed her back, his hand clutching her soft, golden hair.

“Will you take your clothes off?” she asked.

He hardly remembered he was still wearing them but he rolled them once again, his knees on either side of her body and sat up. He unbuttoned his shirt and pulled it off, tossing it behind him.

He went to go remove his hands but she stopped him with a simple, “Wait.”

And then her lips were on his abs and chest, her fingertips trailing up his back.

“Ella,” he sighed.

It was her hands that went to his pants and pushed them down the rest of his legs, she small hand grasping one of his butt cheeks.

He was going to laugh, he wasn’t sure his butt had ever been squeezed, but then he looked down at her and she up at him and there was nothing funny about it. The desire in her eyes was a mirror of his own and he kicked out of his pants.

She placed her hands behind her and used them to pull the rest of her body backwards on the bed, her eyes on his. She fell back against the pillows and he crawled up the bed to her.

Her hand went to his chest and then moved down it, taking hold of him in her small hand.

“I want you,” she told him, as he’d told her, “I want you right now.”

He took hold of her thighs and eased in between them, and it was her who guided him against her.

“I am yours for the taking, Ella,” he promised her.

She lifted her hips, her hand guiding him inside of her, and he felt her sliding over, around, every inch. As he was in her to the hilt her hand left him and went around him, squeezing his ass once again and pulling him against her.

“You feel _so_ good,” he nearly complained.

Her hands moved up his back, one resting at the center and the other gripping his shoulder.

When he was certain he was in control of himself he moved his hips, back and then thrust into her again. She let out a sound of appreciation and the next time he rolled his hips.

“ _Oh_ ,” she cried. He did it again. “ _Robb._ ”

“ _Ella_ ,” he moaned as he rolled back and forth inside of her as languorously as he could.

“Don’t hold back,” she pleaded, as though she could see the effort it was taking, “Give me all of you.”

Any ounce of restraint he had snapped then and he quickened his pace, his hand lifting her thigh as he held himself up with his other arm above her head. He was able to get even deeper then and her lips were right there so he kissed her ardently. He bucked into her and she moaned into his mouth.

He pulled her leg higher and there was no resistance so he moved his hand further down her leg to her calf and pulled it up, until her ankle was at his shoulder.

“For fucks sake,” he groaned, rocking his hips into her, remembering how flexible she was and realizing then that he’d get to explore that in every way imaginable.

He pushed himself off the bed and grabbed her other leg, pulling it up too and then he widened his legs and hovered over her, bracing his hands on her thighs and nipping her ankle as he thrust into her again and again.

“ _Robb, Robb, Robb,_ ” she cried out and he could feel her, clenching his cock tighter and tighter with every one.

His hips were smacking against her butt and her cheeks were pink, her mouth open in a silent cry. One of his hands left her thigh and moved up her stomach and took hold of her breast.

“I’m so close,” she cried, “Touch me, _please_.”

“Always so polite,” he found himself saying, because it was astonishing in the position they were in.

He was quick to acquiesce though and found her pearl with his thumb, pressing against her as his thrusting because more erratic.

“O _ohhhh_ ,” she whimpered and he felt it. He felt every second of it. He nearly came then too but he pushed through it and braced his arms above her, pushing her legs back once again as he rolled his hips over her. Her eyes opened, disbelief in them, “This was so worth the wait.”

He grinned and kissed her because she was so sweet even now, especially now.

“So worth the wait,” he agreed against her lips, his tongue entering her mouth.

He slowed his thrusts, letting her acclimate to him once again, kissing her calf and the bones of her knee.

She lifted off the bed to catch his lips and he pulled her up, her legs traveling back down his body until he could pull her into his lap, as he sat on his calves.

Her hands braced on his shoulders and her eyes looked into his and then she lifted her hips and eased them back down. He held her hip and rocked her against him in the same pattern she’d like so much before and her hands wandered into his hair, her temple against his as she started to ride him.

As she took up a rhythm his hands were free to move around her and they both went to one place, gripping her perfect ass.

“Fuck, Ella,” he groaned as her breasts rubbed against him, her soft thighs moving against his, “You feel so good.” She clenched around him when he told her that, so he went on, “So perfect.”

“So perfect,” she repeated, her movements growing longer, steadier, like she was building towards something. “Oh _oh_ that feels good, _Robb_.”

“So good,” he agreed as she did it again and again. “Gods Ella. You’re close, you’re so close I can feel you. Come for me once more.”

“Yes,” she agreed, gripping his hair, “So close. Oh _gods, mmm._ ”

He felt her come and this time he couldn’t hold back and spilled into her, his body shuddering along with hers. She wrapped her arms around his neck and he fell back onto the bed.

“Oof,” she laughed.

“Sorry,” he chuckled.

She rolled and he rolled with her so that they were both on their sides, their legs intertwined, one of his arms around her back, the other hand where her hip and thigh and butt all met.

He kissed her gently and she kissed him lazily back, her nose rubbing against his. They lay like that, quietly for a while, and he noticed that she showed no signs of nerves now, nor any hesitation about being naked with him. Her naked body felt so good against his, soft where his was hard, slender where he was broader.

“I think there’s something we need to talk about,” she told him.

He pulled away slightly and looked at her, “What’s that?”

Her eyes wandered over his face, “Well, the thing is. I don’t want to leave this room. But I very much want to eat. And more importantly, I want you to eat, so that you have the strength to do that again.”

He chuckled, “Well Ella, you’re in luck.”

He moved and she said, “Not right at the moment.”

He grinned and rolled away from her and looked around the room. He got up and padded over to the desk and grabbed what he wanted and knelt back onto the bed.

“The great things about hotels?” he reminded her, “Room service.”

*

Forty-five minutes later he had her moaning again.

“Those fries should be considered an illegal substance,” she told him after she’d chewed it.

They had dressed, but barely, in the robes provided by the hotel and had ordered roughly half the menu along with a bottle of red wine. It had arrived a few minutes earlier and they’d promptly dug in, sitting on the couch side by side rather than the table the hotel had kindly provided in the suite.

He sipped his wine and set it down before biting into his burger. It had bacon and caramelized onions and gruyere cheese and he’d never tasted anything better in his life. He hadn’t realized how ravenous he was until they’d dialed to order.

Ella was eating crab cakes with one hand and taking another fry and dipping it into the accompanying sauce only to raise it to his lips.

“Trust me,” she ordered.

“In nearly all things,” he agreed, biting it and groaning, “Especially that. What did we get for dessert?”

“I think an easier question would be what _didn’t_ we get for dessert,” she told him, looking at the dishes that remained untouched. “Though I don’t think we got _quite_ enough chocolate mousse for me to actually bathe in it.”

“Pity,” he lamented, taking another bite of his burger.

She grinned and kissed his cheek and then placed her crab cakes down and walked towards their things.

“Do you mind if I check in with Gilly?” she asked.

“Of course not,” he agreed, then looked around, “Where’s my phone? I should see how Theon is holding up.”

Ella had never left Cole alone overnight with anyone apart from Gendry or him. It did not allude him what illustrious company he was in, and it had been that, along with wanting to ensure that she was totally at ease, that suggested she ask Gilly. Cole loved Gilly and he knew that Wes would be very happy with Theon, who was probably allowing him to eat ice cream for dinner and watch a completely inappropriate movie right about now.

Gilly had been _horrified_ by the sum Ella had offered her, cut it in half and accepted.

Ella came back holding both their phones and handed his to him as she typed away. A moment later she smiled and tilted her phone towards him.

It looked like Gilly and Cole had decided to have a spa night and Cole had a towel wrapped around his head and some sort of green goop on his face, a slice of cucumber over one eye and holding up the slice that had clearly been meant for the other, a smile on his adorable face and a bite taken out of the cucumber slice.

“By the _gods_ ,” he chuckled, “That boy.”

“He’s such a kook,” she agreed affectionately, placing her phone down on the table, “Has Theon taken Wes to a frat party?” Robb looked at his own phone and smiled and then tilted it towards her. Her cheek pressed against his as she cooed, “Oh they’re so cozy.”

The picture was of Wes lying on top of Grey Wind on the couch, a blanket over both of them, their faces smooshed together.

“Did Cole ask you anything?” he wondered.

“No,” she told him, looking at one of the plates they hadn’t gotten to yet, “Did Wes?”

He shook his head, “He’s weirdly uncurious about it.”

She smiled, “You sound disappointed.” Glancing at him and tilting her head, “Almost like maybe you _want_ one of them to ask so that we’d be forced to tell them?”

He closed his eyes and smiled, “See you tell me everything, but I don’t have to do that because apparently you can read minds.”

He felt her lips against his and he kissed her back.

“If it bothers you, we’ll tell them tomorrow,” she told him.

He opened his eyes, drinking in the earnestness of her gaze, “You mean that.”

“Of course, I do,” she agreed, as though it were nothing, shrugging, “I _do_ trust your judgment, and if you think it’s the right time then I’ll trust that too. You said you’d wait for me? I’d speed up for you.”

“I…,” he started but he was at a loss for words, “Am crazy about you.” Her cheeks turned pink as she smiled at him, clearly surprised by his response. “But I’m taking your lead on this one. Unless they ask.” He sighed, “It’s just really hard not to kiss you around them.”

Her eyes widened, “Oh my goodness it’s _so_ hard? When you came in the other day with the ice cream and the cashews I wanted to smother you.” He looked at her and she clarified, “With affection.”

He grinned before taking another bite of his burger. It had been a couple of nights earlier, the boys had gone to Ella’s for a playdate and he’d been onsite for a walk-thru. The contractors had been telling him all about the different improvements in the area. Rather than allowing gentrification to push people out, the powers that be had been flooding money into the area, trying to give residents the ability to open restaurants and stores rather than others coming in and hiking up the rents. The crowd favorite had been a new ice cream store and he’d gone and picked up a gallon of pistachio and one of honey lavender. There was a general store right next to it and he’d gone in out of curiosity and founded salted cashews so he got those for Cole, knowing the ice cream wouldn’t be his thing.

“Glad I’m not alone,” he told her.

“No,” she shook her head, “You’re not alone.”

And this time, when she said it, he could almost hear the second part that he’d been wanting to add for some time now. He looked in her eyes and a blush ran up her cheeks and he leaned in and kissed her so that neither had to say it, but so they both knew it.

To finish the sentence was as natural as it was terrifying, but though his lips didn’t say it, his mind did.

_No, you’re not alone, and you never will be again._

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> ahh okay so I'd love to hear what you think. A couple of general things below though. 
> 
> 1) Ella is on the pill and they've already talked about it, I just didn't feel like showing the conversation. But please rest assured these wonderfully communicative babies are being safe.
> 
> 2) This chapter didn't include the kids at all, and it is possible that more chapters in the future won't either. There is still going to be lots of FLUFFY FAMILY WONDERFULNESS going forward but sometimes chapters really will be all about them. Please know that they are still wonderful and devoted parents and that the times they are spending on their own are the absolute outliers. 
> 
> 3) Eeekk what do we think?


	22. Chapter 22

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Warning: This chapter contains graphic depictions of a healthy relationship.
> 
> Oh also, it's long, and all from Myrcella's POV.

“What?” Myrcella asked.

“How?” Wes went on.

“I WAS SO CLOSE!” Robb exclaimed through a gritted teeth smile, thrashing a giggling Cole back and forth.

“Di-ah-a-go-nal,” Cole explained to all of them, tracing his finger across the Sequence board.

Wes had gotten Sequence for Kids as one of his birthday presents and ever since, they’d been playing it nonstop. It was a game that was quick enough to hold their interest – unlike another ill-fated one that had Robb reading and rereading the directions until all of them didn’t know which way to go, what they wanted to do, or honestly, at certain points, who they were. In spite of the quickness and the funnily named animals, it was actually great for strategizing.

And also for how to not be a sore loser.

The four of them had gotten a little ruthless with one another. She and Robb did not hold back from utilizing a Dorothy the dragon card on either of the children, and it was commonplace for alliances to be formed. There were times when she was _genuinely_ disappointed that Cole or Wes had removed one of her tokens, only to be impressed by the one they’d chosen – as it had ruined all possible options for her.

She figured if they were going to merciless, precision was key.

Myrcella pointed at Robb, “You!” His eyes widened and she grinned, “We were so focused on you we didn’t even think about Cole.”

Robb nodded, and informed them all, “To be honest I was pretty focused on me, too.”

Her giggle was joined by Wes and Cole and they all agreed that one last game was in order. They had finished dinner nearly an hour before, so the boys would need to get to bed soon, but as it was a special occasion – their second sleepover, the first at her house – she figured they could stay up a little late.

“Do you want to try shuffling again, sweetheart?” she asked Wes.

He nodded and she handed him the cards and he split the deck in two the way she’d taught him. His brow knit in concentration and the tip of his tongue appeared between his lips as he held the cards on either end and tried to fold them together.

“He’s totally got the mechanics of it,” she told Robb proudly.

“Yeah,” Robb agreed, “It’s just those pesky little hands of his. They’re too small still. Give it another year or two, honey, and you’ll be the best blackjack dealer in the country.”

Wes grinned and handed her back the cards, his eyes on her. For some reason, he loved to watch her shuffle. The fold and the bridge, the criss-cross.

“Alright, I think it’s Cole’s deal,” she said, handing her son the cards.

He passed them out, one by one, and they all looked. The boys had terrible poker faces, but not _quite_ as bad as Robb’s.

She had found herself hoping on more than one occasion that he was better at the office. She knew that he was, he had a reputation as a fierce negotiator, and you couldn’t be that if your face was giving away everything.

It was nice, that he left that part of himself at the office. That with his son, with hers and her, there was no calculation.

Her foot found his leg and she stroked it up his calf. She felt his eyes on her and she gulped as she reordered her cards. It was a habit of hers, though in this game there was very little reason to. Now though it gave her something to do, a reason to avoid the gaze that would certainly put her in an inappropriate state amongst their kids.

The last game was a quick one. Her cards worked perfectly and had she wanted to let Wes or Cole win she couldn’t because no matter which card she picked up, it went with the one she’d just placed down.

They were all gracious in their loss and she and the boys put away the game as Robb brought the bowls they’d been using for fruit to the kitchen sink.

“Alright, important question for you two,” she told them. Wes and Cole both looked at her eagerly, “PJs, teeth brush, books? Orrrrr books, PJs, teeth brush?”

“PJs, teeth brush, books,” Cole determined.

“PJs, teeth brush, books,” Wes seconded.

“Solid plan,” Robb agreed from the sink.

Cole looked at him, “Will you stay and read one of the books?”

Robb glanced at her briefly and she was surprised he’d even ask the question. She didn’t want him to leave any more than the boys did.

That wasn’t what he was asking though.

“I’ll read one,” Robb confirmed and then said to Cole, “If _you_ read one.” Her stomach flip-flopped as he went on, “Grey Wind won’t stop talking about what a good reader you are.”

Cole giggled, “Really?”

She could hear the hope in his voice though, too. Cole had such confidence and he was so outgoing and he loved to read. She could put a stack of books beside him and do whatever she needed to – cook dinner, clean the house, do a yoga or pilates class – and when she’d return to wherever she’d left him he would have been going diligently through the stack, a small satisfied smile on his face.

There was something about the combination of the two though that made him nervous, and it was the perfectionist nature he’d inherited from her that made him resistant to doing anything publicly until he’d mastered it.

It was something she was desperate to rid him of now, but she didn’t know how. If she’d known, she would have stopped long ago.

“Really,” Robb confirmed, like maybe he did.

Which was unsurprising, because he always seemed to know how to pull her out of her head, too.

“Okay,” Cole grinned.

She glanced at Wes who was smiling happily. He could have said that Grey Wind never spoke, he lived with him after all so he knew he wasn’t much of a conversationalist, but he didn’t. He just sat there quietly, as though he too knew what Robb was doing and he wasn’t going to get in the way of anything that helped his friend.

“Alright boys, let’s get you into pajamas and then we’ll come back down and read on the couch,” she suggested.

The four of them trotted up the stairs and she and Robb focused on getting their sons ready for bed.

“They look like they are going to be sleeping in different countries,” she told him as they were brushing their teeth.

Cole, who ran cold like she did, was in feetsie pajamas, where Wes, who couldn’t seem to stand so much as a sheet on him when he slept was in sleep shorts and a t shirt.

“Tag yourself,” Robb told her.

She laughed, “Oh I’m definitely Cole. If they made those in my size I’d be wearing them now. More importantly, how do you know _tag yourself_?”

Robb rolled his eyes, “Rickon.” And then glanced at Cole, “Are you sure those _aren’t_ your size?”

She checked her hip against his and he grinned at her before telling Wes to get in the _way way_ back.

Once the boys’ teeth were brushed they made the important decision of what books to read and then rather than go downstairs, piled into Cole’s bed. She and Robb sat side by side and Wes sat in his Dad’s lap, curling against his chest as Cole lounged against her, holding on to the arms she wrapped tightly around him.

Robb read first, an old, well-worn favorite. She felt herself getting lulled by his warm, steady voice, and by the time it was halfway through her head was against his shoulder. He didn’t move, except to lean his head against hers and then she could feel his voice everywhere.

The boys were so focused on the book they didn’t notice, and she wasn’t entirely sure they would have found anything amiss if they did. They were both so affectionate with them that it probably wouldn’t even register as something out of order.

She could still remember the way her mother would shudder anytime her father invaded her space for even the briefest moments.

That thought was shooed away as Robb finished reading and handed the second book to Cole.

Cole looked up at her briefly and she kissed his temple. He had always been comfortable reading out loud to her, but she was where the list started and ended. Even with Gendry he’d been resistant, not wanting to show his beloved and revered uncle any sign of weakness.

As though Gendry might love him less for it. As though that were possible.

_That my love isn’t conditional, that our relationship isn’t transactional._

Those words that Marg had said to her over Thanksgiving had been on a somewhat never ending loop ever since. She’d told Dr. Dayne about the conversation when she’d returned and they’d talked about it a lot in their sessions following.

She and Tommy had always shared that fear, she did not want Cole to as well.

Cole opened the book and started reading. He’d only gotten halfway through the first page when Robb interrupted.

“What!?” he exclaimed.

Cole smiled and repeated it a little louder to explain. Robb’s warm laugh echoed in the bedroom.

Cole continued reading. He never stumbled over the words, he knew them all, but his voice would grow quieter and quieter.

“He did not do that!” Robb argued.

“Yes, yes he did!” Cole promised him, tilting the book towards him, “See?”

“Wait, read it again,” Robb shook his head in disbelief, “There’s no way.”

Cole read it with more conviction, an unreleased giggle in his voice as he turned the page. And sure enough, every time his voice grew softer, Robb would find _something_ terribly astonishing or amusing or simply in need of being repeated.

Halfway through the book the pair of them were so into it that Cole was turning the pages as quickly as he could, eager for Robb’s reactions to it. Every time Robb gasped or shook his head, Cole’s delicious giggle would follow.

If Robb were anyone else, he would have looked at her halfway through, wanting to get points for what a good job he was doing. He didn’t look at her once, because it wasn’t about her. It was all for Cole.

Soon the book ended and they were all in agreement that it had been a wonderful story and that Cole had done a brilliant job telling it.

They traded kisses and hugs and got them all settled in. She told Wes about the nightlight in this room and the bathroom and reminded him where her bedroom was if he needed anything.

When everyone was well settled she and Robb went to the door and she turned out the light, leaving it slightly ajar for the moment until they were well and truly asleep.

They walked down the hallway and then down the backstairs to the kitchen.

“Do you want something to drink?” she asked.

“No, I’m good,” he shook his head, “Though… is there more of that key lime pie?”

“Ohhh I think I could scrounge up a slice,” she agreed, having planned to send it home with him anyway.

He grinned and went into her cabinet and grabbed a plate and then into a drawer and grabbed out two forks. She pulled the pie out of the fridge and sliced him a generous piece and put it on his plate, licking a bit of filling off of her finger.

He hopped on her counter and patted the spot next to him, so she hopped up too.

She accepted the fork he gave her but merely watched as he dug in, smiling a closed lipped smile as he chewed.

“It’s really so good,” he told her.

“That’s what you say about everything I make,” she reminded him.

“Because everything you make is so good,” he noted, spearing another piece.

She grinned, “I think you’re biased.”

“Towards delicious things?” he asked, tilting his head back and forth, “You’re probably right. That’s why I’m so partial to you.”

Her cheeks flamed and she grinned like a schoolgirl at him, before pressing a kiss to his stubbled cheek. She loved the feel of him after a day of not shaving, and she brushed her nose against the hollow of it.

He turned his face to hers and kissed her lips. She felt flowers blooming in her chest as he kissed her gently, sweetly, with no agenda except to feel her lips against his.

“Oh,” he said as he pulled away from her, “Next weekend Rickon is coming down for the last game of the season, his coach wants him to meet more of the players.”

“That’s great,” she grinned, knowing how excited Robb was to have his little brother coming to school here. “Is he staying with you or are they setting him up in the dorms?”

“Technically he’s staying with me,” Robb noted, “The official Stark Children story is that he is staying with me.” She grinned and he noted, “But if it’s anything like when _I_ visited school to _meet the team_ he will be sleeping wherever he passes out.”

She laughed and nodded, “Sounds about right.”

“The thing is,” Robb said, and she wondered if he wasn’t ready for her to meet Rickon. It would be a little out of character, given that she’d met Sansa and Jon and he’d met Gendry, but Rickon was younger and looked up to Robb, so maybe the rules were different. “He wants to bring his girlfriend. Apparently she applied and is waiting to hear but it is going to be between this and Vale and Rickon is _very_ eager that it should be here.”

“Is it love, then?” she wondered.

Robb grinned, “As close to it as he’s been. I think it’s cool, you know, that he wants her to go with him. Not because I think at seventeen she should be basing that decision off of him, but Rickon is about to be a quarterback for one of the best college teams in the country. He’s going to be treated as a god on that campus, and all that comes with it. And I think it’s sort of cool that even now he knows what’s worth losing and what isn’t.”

She smiled, “I agree, that’s very cool of him. He must have some pretty good role models.” Robb blushed and she grinned, kissing his cheek again, “What’s the problem with her coming?”

“There’s no real _problem_ ,” he said, “But if they do stay with me… do I like, put a lock on her door?”

“I do not recommend you lock a seventeen year old girl in her bedroom,” she grinned.

He chuckled, “I’m trying to _protect_ her virtue.”

She laughed, “And I’m sure that is exactly how the newspapers and police would see it.” Then pointed out, “You know that whatever they are doing they are doing anyway, right?”

“Yeah, I know,” he agreed. “Still if she’s under _my_ roof she’s under _my_ protection, so I guess I can just threaten him under pain of death. Or better yet, pain of a lecture from Sansa. But the thing is, Rickon is going to be pretty busy with stuff for the team, and I know that _you_ went to school there and loved it, and I was thinking maybe you could take her around?”

She grinned, “Ooh I’d love to. I haven’t been back on campus in so long.”

“Thanks,” he smiled back, “And then maybe we’d all go to the game together? You should have seen Wes at the high school game, I’m sure he’ll love college ball and I bet Cole would too.”

“I’m sure he would,” she agreed. “That sounds perfect.” Then couldn’t help but ask, “Do you think Rickon will like me?”

He chuckled, “I think that you might be the only thing that could tempt him away from poor Lyanna Mormont.” He looked at her more seriously though and said, “Of course he’ll like you.”

She closed the distance between them and pressed her lips to his again. His hand went to her neck, his thumb brushing her cheek as he parted her lips. Her arms wrapped around his neck and she pressed her body against his, loving the hard planes of it and the way one of his arms wrapped around her back immediately.

He deepened the kiss, dipping her backwards and her fingers sought his soft curls.

“I uh,” he panted as they broke apart, “Should go.” He panted and then raised his eyebrows, “Right?”

“Probably,” she agreed.

He pressed his lips to hers gently, gripping her hair.

He was the one who ended the kiss and he hopped off the counter and she followed behind. He took her hand as he lead her towards the door.

“Thank you,” she told him, and he glanced at her, “What you did with Cole.”

It took him a moment to place what she was talking about, and that made it clearer than anything that it just came naturally to him.

“He’s just like you,” he told her with a fond smile, leaving it there.

As they got to the front door he turned and looked at her, pulling her by the waist towards him. She stood on her tiptoes so that he would kiss her and he did, his lips a gentle contrast to the hands that grasped like he didn’t want to let her go.

And she didn’t want him to let her go either.

In fact, the idea of saying goodnight, of watching him walk out the door filled her with a sense of dread.

She pulled away from him and she saw the resignation in his eyes as she reached for the door. And the look of surprise that replaced it when she locked it.

She placed her hand in his large one and he looked down at them before interlacing their fingers.

Without a word she turned towards the stairs and walked towards them and up them. He didn’t touch her anywhere else but his hand was there, holding hers as he followed behind.

They walked down the hallway and she peaked in Cole’s room. The boys were sleeping soundly and it was only then, as they both looked at them, that she felt his other hand on her back, rubbing it gently.

It wasn’t a nudge, he wasn’t rushing her, it felt like he wanted her to know that he saw it too. That the sight of them happy and safe and together was the most beautiful thing he could imagine.

It was her who tugged him away, towards her bedroom. He had never been inside of it, but as she closed the door behind them, locking it, and turned towards him she realized that his eyes were looking nowhere but her.

She raised her hand to his cheek, feeling a tender pain in her chest. His lips ghosted over the underside of her wrist.

They, who talked about everything, said nothing now. It felt, in a way, that every conversation they’d ever had was leading to this moment. And like he felt it too, he tugged her gently towards him and kissed her deeply, deeper than he had downstairs, as though he’d been holding back. As though he’d long been holding back and either wouldn’t or couldn’t any longer.

She let herself be kissed, relishing in the feel of it. His lips on hers, his arms wrapped around her, him in her home feeling more natural than she could have possibly imagined.

Her hands wandered down his chest to the hem of his sweater and she pushed it up his body. He helped her pull it off of him and she made quick work of the t shirt underneath.

He was so beautiful. Sculpted and strong without being too muscly. The tuft of auburn hair on his chest and the clean lines of his body.

She pressed her lips to his chest and she felt his hands in her hair as her mouth wandered over him. Her fingers went to his belt buckle and undid it and then unbuttoned his jeans and pulled them down, pushing his boxer briefs down as well.

He was hard and impressive for her already and it made her feel wanted and beautiful, like everything else he did.

His hands moved from her hair down her body, and she looked up at him, raising her arms. His blue eyes drank her in as he lifted the hem of her sweater up and over her head. He smoothed her hair and pulled her to him again, his lips kissing hers reverently.

Robb’s hands moved down her back and he unclasped her bra and then as that fell to the floor they traveled to her yoga pants and pulled them down along with her underwear.

One of his hands moved up her back slightly, grasping her waist and the other moved down, taking a hold of her thigh. He picked her up easily, her legs wrapping around his waist. She held onto his shoulders as he walked her towards the bed.

Their eyes never left one another’s and when he reached the bed, rather than placing her on it he got on it on his knees.

He lowered her slowly, as though she was weightless, and as her back touched the bed he hovered over her.

His blue eyes were tinged in red at the edges and he stayed there like that, looking at her as her calves lowered to fall against his.

His gaze fell down her body, lingering over it. She felt it on every part of herself as he got to it, his breath cracking.

She took his face gently in his hands, not because she was afraid of him to be looking but because she wanted him. His cool blue eyes had turned to flames and when she raised off of the bed to catch his lips he fell against her, wrapping her in his arms.

He rolled them then until she straddled him and she raised up. Her body ached for him and she took hold of his length in her hand, her eyes on his as she sank down onto him.

It was her that cried out, feeling him fully. He didn’t make a sound until she rocked back and forth on him and then he moaned, a great rumble from his stomach as though every inch of him felt her.

She rocked her hips back and forth on him, feeling his length move inside of her, the arch of her hips brushing her most sensitive part against him with every movement.

She watched his face as she moved, he was no better at concealing his emotions here and she craved them all. The wonder, the pleasure, the absolute need.

Her hands braced her on his chest and she leaned forward, relishing in the new angle. Her face hovered above his and she felt his fingers on her skin. They were so light, like she was the butterfly he’d cautioned Wes to be gentle with, like he couldn’t believe she’d landed right in his palm.

They traced slow, sweeping patterns on her back and she cried out from the sheer sweetness of it. The contrast of him was impossible.

Her body had a mind of its own, rolling against his like a wave. All she could focus on was how good he felt inside of her and how handsome he looked below her and she trusted her hips to work perfectly with his.

She circled them and he groaned, his back lifting off of the bed and his arms wrapping around her, tilting her up and then backwards as she continued to ride him.

Her head fell back and his lips found her neck, lowering her back further, his other hand grasping her breast, his thumb brushing her nipple. She moaned, taking him inside of her again and again and his hand moved up her chest and took hold of her neck, tilting her head so that her gaze fell to his.

Tears pricked her eyes without her consent when she saw the way he was looking at her. Her lip trembled and he let out a cry of his own before his lips met hers.

His fingers tangled in her hair and her arm wrapped around his neck, the other hand on his cheek.

She kissed him until she couldn’t any longer, her temple falling against his cheekbone as all she could focus on was the building inside of her. She was close, but she didn’t tell him, she knew he could feel it, as she could feel him near his own.

“Look at me,” he pleaded against her ear.

It was the first time either of them had spoken and his voice reverberated in her body. She pulled away to look him in the eyes and her entire body _snapped,_ crumbling in his arms. His grip was harsh for the first time as he held onto her for dear life as he followed behind her.

As he came down his grip loosened but didn’t leave her, instead he wrapped her more fully in his arms. She wrapped her own around his neck and leaned her cheek against his shoulder.

His lips found her other one, pressing warm, lingering kisses to the slope of it.

“I don’t want you to go,” she whispered.

“Then I won’t,” he told her, his voice almost broken, “Not for a while, anyway.”

She tightened her arms around him and closed her eyes, breathing him in. His lips continued their languorous attentions to her cheek and temple and jaw and shoulder.

Ever since they’d left the hotel room on Saturday morning, she had wanted him. Knowing what his naked body felt like against hers, inside of hers, his hands and lips all over her. She had thought it was difficult before but knowing was so much more than wondering.

She tugged him gently, letting him know she wasn’t leaving him, just moving, and then she settled onto her back on the bed, her head against the pillows.

He didn’t join her, he sat beside her, one of his hands on the bed as he leaned over her. His fingertips wandered her chest and breasts and ribs and stomach.

“Ella,” he sighed, she looked at him and his eyes searched hers, “You are so beautiful.”

“I feel beautiful,” she admitted. His answering smile brought tears to her eyes and she told him, “You make me feel beautiful for the first time in so long.”

He moved up the bed, his thumb stroking her cheek and then her bottom lip.

“How is that possible?” he asked. Then clarified, “I’m genuinely asking.”

She sat back up and his hand brushed her hair behind her ear before it cupped her head.

“I know that I’m not ugly,” she confessed. And then tried to think about how to explain it. She realized that she was trying to find a nice way to explain it, one that wouldn’t make her sound too awful, before she remembered that she was talking to Robb and she didn’t have to do that. “In the months after Cole was born, after Trystane died, I… it took every ounce of strength I had to just get up in the morning. To feed him and change him and all the rest. I guess I didn’t really have it in me to try. I didn’t really want to see anyone, apart from Gendry then, so I suppose it had been a while since I saw Marg or Tommy or my Mother or Arianne. I hadn’t seen them since the funeral. And they came to visit in April, when Cole was about 9 months old, to see me for my birthday. It felt more like an intervention than a celebration, not that I wanted one. And the look in their eyes when they saw me…”

She could still remember it. The disgust in her mother’s. The pity in Tommy’s. The concern in Marg’s. The sadness in Arianne’s.

“I hated it,” she told him, “It made me feel… so…”

“Inadequate,” he supplied.

She nodded, “And it sort of snapped me out of it. You know it was hard at first but I started booking the appointments. The hair and the nails. I started exercising again. I’d had so little appetite that I’d lost the weight but nothing felt in its right place. By the time of Cole’s first birthday when they all saw me they told me how great I looked, most of them anyway. I didn’t care, I didn’t feel like I looked great, all I cared about was that they were no longer looking at me like _that_. So I kept it up. I realized if I looked okay, people would treat me like I was, and it was easier. But after that… I never really felt pretty. Or I guess, the prettiness always felt like something separate to me.” She looked into his eyes, “Do I sound horribly vain?”

“No,” he told her, his voice hoarse. She was caught off guard by the sheer force of it. He must have seen it on her face because he pressed a gentle kiss to her forehead, “I’m sorry. I’m… I’m really angry. The idea that they, that _anyone,_ let alone your family would make you feel bad for not caring about your appearance… you had just given _birth_ Ella. You had a newborn baby and no help. You had just lost your husband and they were… and when I think about you feeling that shame… I… Can I ask you something?”

“You can ask me anything,” she assured him quickly, not trusting her voice.

“Do you want me to stop?” he asked, “Telling you that you’re – You are the most beautiful woman in the world but you are so much more than that to me and I don’t want you to ever feel like if you miss a fucking hair appointment that I’m going to stop valuing you.”

“I don’t,” she exulted, “That’s the thing. For the first time in so long, I feel it. When you look at me, I feel so beautiful and I know you don’t care about that stuff. If I forget to shave a spot on my leg or I haven’t had time to pull myself together, you never look at me any differently. You make everything okay, but it’s more than that actually.”

“How so?” he asked.

“It feels good,” she admitted, “Not being perfect. Not being able to do everything myself. Tonight, with the boys, with Cole reading. A few months ago, watching you pull him out of himself might have made me feel inadequate, like I was failing because I hadn’t thought of it. But tonight all I felt was gratitude and joy watching the two of you, seeing how brave you make him. And it feels so good, Robb, it feels so much better than I can explain. And when you looked at me like you did tonight, I realized I hadn’t even thought about putting on make up or something nicer than yoga pants and an old sweater. It just feels really good to be wanted for the bits of myself that I don’t show to anyone else.”

“It means a lot to me, to hear you say that about me and Cole,” he told her. She looked at him and he went on, “I watch you with Cole, but with Wes too, and you are so stunning, Ella. Not in the way you look but in who you are. The things you do, the things that come so naturally to you, the ones you don’t give any thought, are so unbelievable. And it took some getting used to. It would be very easy for you to make any parent, let alone another single parent, feel like they are failing. But you’ve always shown such trust in me, from the very first moment. And it made me feel capable, like I was actually good at this, the most important thing I’ll ever do in my life. And when you let me in, not just with you, but with Cole, whose heart is so much more important to you than yours will ever be, it makes me feel… worthy. Like I’m not an imposter. Like I’m exactly where I’m supposed to be.”

It was incomprehensible, that this titan of a man could doubt himself.

“And Ella,” he stroked her cheek, “I crave you. I am greedy, and insatiable, and I don’t think any measure of you will ever leave me satisfied. And I… want you to feel confident showing those bits of yourself to the world, but if you _can’t_ , give them all to me.”

“You’re exactly where you’re supposed to be,” she told him simply, tears dripping down her cheeks.

She didn’t trust herself to say anything more now, but she vowed then and there, to herself if not to him, to make sure he never doubted himself again. It had always been so obvious to her, what a wonderful father he was. She couldn’t have fallen for anyone who wasn’t. And she realized then that she was not the only one who didn’t see herself clearly.

He didn’t seem to need more than that because his lips crashed against hers and then he was on top of her and inside of her and she felt so wanted and she hoped he knew he was needed. Because happily, he was.

*

When she woke she was in bed alone. After their second time she’d put on pajamas in case the boys needed her, but he hadn’t left, he’d crawled into bed with her in his boxers and t shirt.

They hadn’t spoken much but they hadn’t needed to, and it was unsurprising that she’d drifted off.

She heard movement and she turned her head towards the door, still lying on her stomach.

“Robb?” she yawned. She felt the bed dip as he sat down on it. “You’re leaving?”

His large hand rubbed her back and he told her, “I should go. The boys. And I’ve got to let Grey Wind out.”

She nodded at the sense of that, turning over so that she could look up at him, “Will you and Grey Wind come back for breakfast?”

“You just want my eggs, don’t you?” he teased.

“Yes,” she smiled, “And…”

“It’ll be too early in the day for my beef stew,” he teased.

She giggled sleepily, her eyes closed as her fingers reached up to his face. She felt him kiss her fingertips and was struck with a great burst of confidence.

“I was going to say,” she corrected, “That I think we should tell Cole and Wes.”

He was silent and she opened her eyes, sitting up.

“Do you mean that?” he asked, “You’re sure?”

“If you still want to,” she noted.

“I want to,” he told her quickly. “What do you think we should say?”

“I think we should tell them…,” she thought about it, “Well they know that Sam and Gilly are dating, right? So we can just say that it’s like that, and that we love them very much, and nothing will change for them.”

“Except that we’ll kiss in front of them,” he pointed out.

She smiled, “Except that.”

“What time should I be here?” he asked her.

“You know we’ll be up early,” she shrugged. “Sleep in as much as you can and take a nice long run and come over when you’re ready.”

“So I’ll see you around… 7:15,” he teased.

She giggled and pressed a soft kiss to his lips, “Perfect.”

He stroked her cheek, “Go back to sleep.”

She twisted her body so that she could lay down on her stomach once again and closed her eyes. She expected to feel the mattress dip again but instead she felt his hand on the back of her head, stroking her hair.

“I thought you were leaving,” she yawned.

“I will in a minute,” he promised.

She wasn’t sure how long he sat there, only that he still was by the time she fell asleep.

*

She woke before six without an alarm as usual and hopped into the shower. She washed her hair and body quickly and dressed for the day. They hadn’t made a plan yet so she pulled on a slim, cropped pair of navy blue and green plaid pants and an oversized cream sweater and stepped into a beat up pair of mules that she could always replace for sneakers if they were going to go outside. She swiped on some deodorant and brushed her teeth and swept her hair into a bun so that it wouldn’t be in her way while she was cooking.

When she was ready she left her room and walked down to Cole’s. She poked her head inside and smiled when she saw Wes sitting in bed reading while Cole slept beside him.

“Hey you,” she whispered.

He turned and smiled before whispering, “Hey you.”

“Want to come help me make muffins?” she asked, “You don’t have to if you want to keep reading.”

“I want to help,” he told her.

She smiled at him, “Bring the book, we can finish it while they’re in the oven.”

He got out of bed and padded over to her and she leaned down. He wrapped his arms around her neck and she picked him up, pressing kisses to his still sleep-warm cheek.

“How did you sleep, sweetheart?” she asked.

“Good,” he told her as she walked down the hall with him.

As she got to the stairs she set him down and he followed her like a little duckling. He walked over to the sink and she lifted him up so that he could watch his hands and then he settled himself at the island while she started pulling out ingredients.

“Can I get you something to drink?” she asked, “Juice, water, milk?”

“Water, please,” Wes agreed.

She poured him a glass and then one for herself and then made herself a vanilla latte in her espresso machine.

“Alright, sweetheart,” she looked at him, “Blueberry?” He scrunched his face, “Yeah, definitely not blueberry. Chocolate chip?”

“Warmer,” he confirmed.

“Hmm…,” she tapped her lips, “Ba _nana_ chocolate chip?”

“Yeah _baby_ ,” he grinned.

“So that’s sticking around then?” she asked.

He’d been saying it ever since he’d spent the night at Theon’s. Cole had started too.

“Yeah _baby_ ,” he answered, and she chuckled as she started to make sure the bananas she had were overripe enough.

“What do you think we should do today?” she asked as she started placing all the essentials around him.

“Museum?” he suggested.

She glanced outside and saw that it had already started raining, “I think that might be our best bet. Children or Science?”

“Is the planuhtaireeum open?” he asked.

“I don’t think so,” she grabbed her phone and went to the museum’s website, “It’s still under renovations. What do you think about the children’s museum?”

“It’s kind of…” he trailed off.

“Baby-ish?” she supplied.

“Yeah,” he confirmed, “I really liked it last year but not _this_ year.”

She surveyed him, nodding at his wisdom and agreed, “I see what you mean. What about… oh have you ever been to the art museum?”

“Art museum?” he asked her, as though she’d just suggested they go look at dung beetles for the better part of the afternoon.

“Yes! Remember how much fun Babar has at the art museum?” she dangled.

“Yeah…,” he said warily.

“Oh or there is the history museum,” she realized, “I haven’t been there in ages. But it’s got a really cool display of armour and swords and what not.”

Wes’ eyes lit up, “Like from _battles_?”

“Yeah,” she smiled, “Like from battles _hundreds_ of years ago.”

“YEAH!” Wes said. Then suggested, “We should invite Uncle Brynden. He loves that stuff.”

“I think that is a _wonderful_ idea, sweetheart,” she agreed. “Your Daddy’ll be here soon and we can suggest it then.”

“Or we can call him now, I know his number,” he told her.

“You do?” she asked.

Wes nodded, “He made me memorize it so he could bail me out of jail.”

She snorted out a laugh before she could help it. That was such a Brynden thing to say. Of course he’d want his great-great-nephew to have his telephone number memorized, because he was wonderful, but there was always a bit of a sting along with the sweet. She loved that about him.

She glanced at the clock, “I think it’s a _little_ early to call.”

Wes agreed and they mixed everything together for the muffins as she drank her latte. She let him scoop them into the tray and then she put it in the oven with a timer.

Once they got washed up they went into the living room and sat on the couch.

“Are you reading or am I?” she asked.

“Will you do the voices?” he asked.

She took one of a very old woman, “Don’t I _always_?”

He giggled and handed her the book and she started reading. He snuggled in against her and she stroked his soft hair as she read. The weight of him against her was so comforting, his giggle better than any music.

When they were halfway through, a zombie appeared in the room.

“Morning baby,” she smiled.

“Hi Cole! We made muffins!” Wes greeted him.

Cole grunted in response.

“Ooh I should go check on them, hold our spot okay, sweetheart?” she handed Wes the book.

She hopped off the couch and bent down and pressed a kiss to Cole’s cheek. He leaned against her, grasping for her with his eyes closed.

“Uh oh,” she lamented, “We’ve got a zombie situation.”

“It’s an emergency,” he cooed, his eyes still closed.

She picked him up and he settled against her hip, his arms wrapped around her and his head on her shoulder.

“I missed you,” she squeezed him tightly, “Did you sleep?”

“Mmm,” he agreed.

The muffins were done so she took them out of the oven and turned it off, knowing she could make the bacon when Robb got here and they had fruit left over from last night.

“Is it too early for something to drink?” she asked.

“Mmmhm,” he agreed into her neck.

She brought him back into the living room and settled onto the couch, adjusting him so that his head wasn’t at a terrible angle.

Wes glanced at her and she lifted her other arm and his grin knocked her socks off. He burrowed into the other side of her neck.

“Will you be in charge of the pages, sweetheart?” she asked.

“Yes,” he whispered back.

“You can talk,” Cole mumbled.

She and Wes laughed and then Wes reopened the book and she continued on through the story. By the time she was done, Cole was more awake and laughing along with Wes.

They were talking about what to read next when the doorbell rang.

“Daddy!” Wes exclaimed.

“Robb!” Cole exulted.

“Robb!” she couldn’t help but exclaim.

It felt good to be around people who got her. They were so aware of his greatness that they didn’t even question her excitement. It was _Robb Stark_ , after all.

The three of them bounded into the front hallway and she unlocked the door and then he was there.

“Hi,” he smiled at her, and then down at the boys, “Hi, Hi.”

“Get in here it’s _raining_ ,” Cole ordered.

“You guys are blocking the way,” he pointed out with a laughing tone.

They all scattered out of the way like the rats in Ratatouille, to make room for him and Grey Wind.

As soon as Robb was inside, Wes and Cole jumped at him, so she focused on petting Grey Wind.

“We made muffins!” Wes told him.

“You did?” Robb asked his son and then glanced at her, “Why is _that_ not surprising?”

“Banana chocolate chip,” Wes went on.

“Our favorite,” Robb grinned, stroking Wes’ cheek. He then picked up Cole by his feetsie pajamas, “And let me guess. You were sleeping like a champion?”

“Y-e-sss,” Cole giggled.

“Atta boy,” Robb set him back down. “I want to see who can get to the kitchen fastest. On your mark, get set, go!”

Wes and Cole screamed and then sprinted towards the kitchen, Grey Wind chasing after them.

They watched them long enough to make sure neither of the boys was turning back and then she and Robb launched themselves at one another.

“You smell like butter,” he told her, kissing her neck.

“You’re a very weird man,” she laughed.

“Do you still want to tell them?” he asked her.

“Yeah you’re not _that_ weird,” she teased, rubbing her nose against his, “More odd, really.”

He chuckled against her and kissed her lips, “You’re lucky I wasn’t here at 5 am. I didn’t sleep a wink.”

“Really?” she asked, “I slept like a rock.”

He looked pretty smug about that and kissed the blush that rose on her cheeks.

He set her down and they walked towards the kitchen. Robb squeezed her ass on the way and she yelped.

“Daddy loses,” Wes informed them all as she walked in with Robb trailing her.

“Oh, I’m not sure I’d say that,” Robb noted and she busied herself with getting out two frying pans so that none of them would see her blush.

Once again Robb wouldn’t let her see what went into the eggs so she and the boys set the table while he made the eggs and bacon. She brought the muffins over and grabbed out the bowl of fruit.

“Coffee?” she asked Robb.

“Do you have any made?” he looked around.

“No,” she admitted, “But I can make you one of those vanilla lattes you pretend not to like.”

“If it’s um… no trouble,” he agreed.

“It’s um… no trouble,” she teased.

He grinned at her and she made him his latte before filling a pitcher with water. When the eggs and bacon were ready they all settled around the table and were quiet for a few minutes as they started eating.

“So,” she started and Robb glanced at her, “Wes and I thought we should go to the history museum today.”

“The history museum?” Cole asked, munching on a strip of bacon.

“They have swords,” Wes noted, as he picked a chocolate chip out of his muffin and ate it on its own.

“Coo-oo-ool,” Cole agreed.

“Coo- _ool_ ,” Robb agreed. “We should invite Uncle Brynden.”

“That’s what I said!” Wes grinned.

Robb looked at his son and smiled, nodding at him like he was the wisest person in the whole world.

When they were all picking at the remnants on their plates, she and Robb glanced at one another.

“Boys,” Robb addressed them, taking the lead. The same calm she felt when he drove them all overtook her now. “There’s something we want to talk to you about.” Cole and Wes both looked at him and Robb told them quickly, “It’s nothing bad, it’s a good thing, but it’s important so we want you both to know. Ella,” he said to Wes and then turned to Cole, “Your Mommy and I are dating.”

“Dating?” Cole asked.

“Like Gilly and Mr. Tarly?” Wes asked.

“Exactly, sweetheart,” she agreed.

“What does that _mean_?” Cole asked and she couldn’t help but smile.

He was so like her in his desire to understand the way of things.

“It means…,” she started and then glanced at Robb, “It means that we care about each other a lot. And we _love_ both of you. And nothing much will change.”

“Except you might see us kiss,” Robb nodded, and she bit her lip to hide her smile because she liked how important that bit was to him. “Or hold hands, or cuddle.”

“And every so often we’ll go on dates?” she told them and asked Robb. He nodded.

“But _we_ still get to hang out?” Wes asked, “All of us.”

“Of course,” she promised.

“Yeah honey,” Robb told him, “We’ll all probably spend more time together.”

Cole and Wes looked at each other, wide grins on their faces, “Awesome!” “Cool!” “Sleepovers foreverandever.”

“Do you have any questions?” she asked.

Cole looked at her and scrunched her nose, “Are you like Toothless and the Light Fury?”

She grinned and Robb chuckled, “I feel like we’re more Anna and Kristoff.”

Wes giggled, “No Ella looks like Rapunzel.”

She blushed as Robb closed his eyes, a huge smile on his face, “Which would make me: _Flynn Rider._ Yeah _baby!_ ”

“Not you, too,” she collapsed against her chair.

“Yeah _baby_ ,” they all agreed, looking at her expectantly.

There was only one response to their three precious faces, so she agreed, “Yeah _baby_!”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> oh and for any of you Made in Chelsea fans, the "yeah BABY" is absolutely how Proudlock says it. Not sure what made it enter my mind but it felt like something Theon would say


	23. Chapter 23

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Okay this chapter is SO long? And I have no idea how it happened. I didn't even *really* intend the first part to be a thing but then I started writing it and figured I *ought* to share it. 
> 
> Anywho, it's going to be REALLY hard to convince me not to keep these babies happy and totally into one another. Is that wrong? Or are you guys on board to just read chapters and chapters of them being happy?
> 
> Oh and back to the first part again... as for Ella... all I can say it is amazing what wonders sex with Robb Stark can do for a girl's confidence...

“Yes, I _promise_ that if Uncle Rickon surprises me by switching to an earlier flight I will come and get you out of school,” Robb agreed.

Finally satisfied, Wes settled back into his car seat just in time for them to pull into the parking lot of his school.

To say that Wes was excited about Rickon coming was an understatement. The two of them had talked at length over Thanksgiving about Guys Nights and football games and Robb wasn’t entirely sure his little brother hadn’t promised to help Wes pledge a fraternity.

Of all of his siblings, they got alone time with Rickon the least. They saw him more than they saw Arya in any given year, as they always saw him when they went up North, but as he was still in high school he didn’t do a lot of solo traveling. Arya, on the other hand, would come and stay with them for a couple of weeks sometimes. There was no rhyme or reason to it, but when she was here they had her all to themselves.

Wes was obsessed with Rickon. The closest uncle to him in age, Rickon treated him more like a little brother than anything else. In truth, there were fewer years between the two of them than there were between him and Rickon – twelve to fourteen – and it was easy to believe there were less than that with the two of them racing or demanding ice cream for dinner or any of the other antics they got up to.

He’d expected Wes to be upset to hear that Lyanna Mormont was coming in tow. His son had taken it in stride though, not seeming to give it much thought.

Robb on the other hand had given it a lot of thought. He knew that Ella was right. Whatever Rickon and Lyanna were up to wasn’t going to be much deterred by his presence for a weekend. He wasn’t even entirely sure why he cared so much. It wasn’t like he hadn’t gotten up to everything when he was Rickon’s age.

His little brother just seemed so _young_ to him. In truth, looking at him side by side with Wes, he really did seem closer to an age with his son than with him. They were both still kids.

He’d spoken to Dacey, who he’d gone to high school with and who had taken custody of Lyanna and her other sisters when their mother died. Dacey had spoken highly of Rickon, but had suggested the same thing that Ella had. Far less delicately.

Rickon and Lyanna’s flight got in after dinner tonight, so Wes was pretty bummed that he’d only get to see him on the ride home from the airport before going to bed.

He pulled into a spot and shut off the car. It was mercifully dry out and he hoped the weather held, not wanting them to be delayed or worse yet, have their flight cancelled. He wasn’t sure that he or Wes could take it.

They walked hand in hand into the school and then through the halls to the classroom. He greeted Sam, who smiled at them both warmly.

He’d joined Gilly for dinner with them on Wednesday night, and they and he and Ella had such a good time, playing a vicious game of Spades, that they’d tucked Cole happily into bed with Wes. He’d carried him sleeping to her car at the end of the night after she’d demurred his offer for them both to stay over.

Sam was a hell of a Spades player and now that he could look him in the eye was actually on his way to becoming a friend.

In all the time he’d known her, he had never seen Gilly so happy. There had always been a sadness to her, amongst the kindness, and it was, in a way, why they’d all gelled so well together. She bloomed under Sam’s gaze though, and it was wonderful to see how well he treated her, how much care was in every gesture.

“Cole!” Wes called.

Robb turned with a grin but his face fell when he saw Cole leaned against Ella’s leg with his eyes closed. She was stroking his hair and smiling at him and Wes, and he brought his son over to join them.

“We okay?” he asked them.

“We had a bit of a sleepless night, didn’t we, baby?” Ella asked Cole gently.

“Yeah,” he yawned.

Robb glanced at her and she mouthed _nightmares_ and he winced sympathetically. There were faint purple circles underneath her eyes and it was clear that she’d gotten no more sleep than her son had.

“Rest time will be soon,” Wes promised Cole sweetly.

“Yeah,” Cole yawned.

Wes looked at him and then at Ella, clearly unsure of how to help his friend.

“We could read,” he suggested.

“Okay,” Cole nodded, “Bye Mommy.”

“Bye baby,” Ella leaned down and wrapped Cole in her arms, kissing his temple, “I’m around all day if you want to come home and sleep.”

Robb leaned down and pressed a kiss to his son’s forehead, stroking his hair, “You’re a good boy.”

“Love you Daddy,” Wes told him happily.

“Love you too, honey,” he promised.

“Bye-ya sweetheart,” Ella cooed at Wes.

“Bye-ya Ella,” Wes grinned back.

Usually, Cole liked it when he tossed him around or held him up by one arm or even by his legs. Today though he was afraid if he didn’t any of those things Cole might collapse.

He didn’t have to think about what to do because Cole walked the short distance and leaned his cheek against his leg, wrapping an arm around his knee. Robb stroked his hair and looked around for Sam.

He caught their teacher’s eyes and gestured to Cole and made a call gesture. Sam nodded and waved to Ella and then Wes took Cole by the hand and pulled him away.

“So how much sleep did you get?” he asked Ella as they got outside.

“It’s better if you don’t know,” she smiled. “I could… use some coffee though… if you’re interested…”

His body reacted immediately and he cleared his throat. On Monday when he’d walked Ella out to her car, he’d been so desperate to kiss her, after having spent all weekend being able to do just that, and had happened to mention that he didn’t have any meetings until that afternoon. That had prompted Ella to invite him over for coffee, which he’d readily accepted. He’d gone over for _coffee_ every morning since then.

They never actually got around to drinking it. Not when he was there anyway. Yesterday she’d pressed a to-go cup into his hand as he kissed her goodbye for the seven hundredth time.

“I’d love to,” he told her honestly but grimaced, “But I have a call first thing. I’m sorry,” he told her as they got to her car, “But I couldn’t change it.”

She smiled at him, “That’s okay. I know you can’t be late to work every day.”

“I uh,” he coughed, “Just have to call in for it, the meeting, I mean. Which… I could technically do from anywhere.”

She smiled, her hand reaching out and taking his tie gently between her fingertips, “Have I ever told you how good the reception is at my house?”

His grin overtook his face and he shook his head, “No I don’t think you’ve mentioned that before.”

“Oh,” she looked up at him, “Well it’s really just… top notch.”

He chuckled and swiped his thumb underneath her eye, “You don’t mind waiting?”

She shook her head and then glanced around before looking back up at him and closing the distance between them. He could feel her slight body against his and he wanted to take hold of her then and there.

“No,” she promised, “I’ll just undress very, _very_ slowly.”

“Ella,” he groaned and then looked at her, “Real or fake?”

“Real,” she told him firmly, looking deep into his eyes, “I’ll never fake it with you again.” And then, in case she hadn’t gotten him in a very embarrassing situation already, she leaned up and whispered in his ear, “ _Thankfully you’ve never given me a reason to_.”

“Get in your car,” he ordered, “And drive very quickly but safely to your house.”

She grinned at him and got into her car and he all but ran over to his. He wouldn’t have time to do much of anything before his meeting, but he’d at least be able to kiss her.

By the time he pulled into her drive he was hard as a rock and she was standing there waiting for him.

“How long do you think your call will be?” she asked.

“Trying to figure out how to pace your torture?” he teased.

“No,” she laughed and then her brow furrowed, “I just… _want_ you.”

He closed the distance between them and scooped her up in his arms.

“Robb,” she giggle-moaned as he attacked her neck, “What will the neighbors think?”

“You don’t have neighbors,” he reminded her, walking her up the steps to her house.

He set her down and she unlocked the door as he pulled her body back against his. She rubbed her ass against him and he actually whimpered before pushing her inside.

They went into the kitchen and he set her on her counter, parting her legs so that he could get in between them. Her lips met his and she sighed against his mouth, like she’d been waiting for it. Like she hadn’t been able to stop thinking about it.

He buried his hands in her hair, licking into her mouth as her hands wandered his back.

“What time is your call?” she asked him.

“Right now,” he murmured against her neck and then behind her ear.

She shivered and then giggled, her hand coming around him, hovering just briefly over his clothed cock before reaching into his pocket and grabbing his phone.

“Call in,” she ordered. He fixed her with a look and she shook her head, “I won’t be having anyone blaming me for distracting you.”

He sighed and opened his phone and went to the meeting invitation. He pressed the call in button. Ella’s eyes were on his as they listened to the company’s hold music and then a noise alerted him that he’d joined the call.

“This is Robb Stark,” he informed whoever was on.

“Yes, good morning Mr. Stark,” an eager voice said, “Thanks for joining so promptly, this is Wally. We’re just waiting for everyone else to join.”

“Thanks Wally,” he grinned at Ella’s smile, “I’m actually in the middle of something so I’m going to mute myself while we wait for everyone to dial-in.”

“Yes, Mr. Stark,” Wally agreed, “Of course, Mr. Stark.”

He pressed mute, double checking to make sure that he actually had done it and then looked at Ella, “Kiss me.”

“Yes, Mr. Stark,” she teased, and then whispered against his lips, “Of course, Mr. Stark.”

He chuckled against her, holding her soft cheek in his hand as he kissed her. It was gentle, almost lazy at first, and then Ella’s breath caught and he deepened it. The alert was going again and again, telling him that more and more people were joining the call.

“Where’s Robb?” he heard a voice ask.

It was Brynden, who was clearly joining the meeting from the conference room in the office.

“He’s on the line, Mr. Tully,” Wally informed Brynden, which gave him another moment to suck on Ella’s edible lower lip.

“Robb?” Brynden asked though.

He felt Ella smile against him and he pulled away, unmuting himself, “I’m here.”

“Then get in here,” Brynden noted.

Ella covered her mouth to stop laughing and he knew that everyone could probably here the smile in his voice when he said, “I’m not in the office yet. I uh…had something to take care of this morning.”

Ella’s eyes went wide and she nudged him with her foot.

“Good morning, Ella,” Brynden said into the phone.

“Hi Brynden,” she squeaked.

“Am I seeing you this weekend?” he asked her.

“Of course,” she agreed in a voice more similar to her normal one. “And now I’m going to leave you all to it.” She went to slide away and he stopped her with a hand to her wrist so she looked at his phone and muted him again and then said, “I’m going to _actually_ make coffee.”

He pressed another kiss to her lips but released her and then moved so that he could sit on one of the stools. It was their bi-weekly meeting in which different teams reported on their progress. There were times when it was a bit of a bore, but it gave him and Brynden oversight and the ability to troubleshoot with people running the day to day. At worst, it was an hour of his life he never got back, but at best it was an opportunity for collaboration that allowed people to leave the silos of their divisions to work together.

He listened as he watched Ella make coffee. A moment later a slice of something appeared in front of him. It was a gingerbread loaf and it was delicious.

He swallowed and took himself off of mute, “Wally didn’t you work with that law firm last year?”

“Yes, sir, we did,” Wally agreed.

“You became friendly with that junior partner,” he remembered, though the name alluded him, “Why don’t you make some introductions.”

The person he was suggesting be introduced, one of the regional heads, started to argue.

“Robb, I don’t think that’s necessary, their role is tertiary at most,” the man told him.

“Why would we make it more difficult on ourselves?” Brynden cut in for him. “Fine, they aren’t going to be the thing that clinches it but they can still be our advocate.”

“Brynden’s right,” Robb backed him up, “Wally made major strides in that relationship which was crucial to that complicated piece of business, so let’s use his hard work to our advantage, alright?”

He turned when he felt Ella’s eyes on him and raised his brow. She gave him a small smile and then kept unloading the dishwasher.

After another ten minutes he felt Ella’s eyes on him again. He turned to look at her, just in time to see her pulling down the zipper on her zip up. Her eyes were on his as she pulled it off, revealing a white tank top underneath.

He asked the person speaking, “Isn’t that behind schedule?”

Ella’s mouth dropped open in feigned horror and he shook his head at her, trying to stop himself from grinning but not being able to.

He tried his best to listen to the person’s answer but Ella had started lifting the hem of her shirt. She was walking towards him, which made it difficult to see her over the counter so he leaned over, watching as she revealed her belly button and then her ribs. He could see a hint of lace.

“That’s unacceptable,” Brynden’s voice snapped him out of it.

The person started to defend himself and Robb sadly ignored Ella’s torture by focusing on them, “They do this all the time, it’s not your fault, you just need to escalate it. Brynden do you want to call them or should I?”

“You know what will happen if I do,” Brynden noted.

“Right,” he agreed and found it very hard to think as Ella revealed her lace bralet to him. He put his hand over his eyes to cover them and said, “Hunter, we’ll call them together. I don’t want them or you to think I’m going over your head. You’ll lead the call and I’ll be the bumpers, alright? Aggie, are you on?”

Aggie answered, “I’ve just set up a call for you all on Monday.”

Robb uncovered his eyes and opened them to find Ella with her finger tips in the waistband of her yoga pants, starting to slip them down her hips, “ _Beautiful_.”

“I do what I can,” Aggie quipped and Ella grinned.

She walked towards him and pressed mute on his phone, stepping in between his legs. His hands went to her body immediately, wandering over her smooth, soft skin. She draped her arms on his shoulders.

“I’m going to go upstairs and wait for you to come take off the rest,” she informed him.

“If this isn’t over in two minutes they are all fired,” he promised.

She gave him a gorgeous smile, before leaning in close. She didn’t kiss him, her lips didn’t touch his, but she rubbed her nose against his before turning and walking away.

He watched her go, her body covered only by a lace thong and bra, her golden hair tumbling down her shoulders. She turned as she got to the stairs and looked at him once more. There was no surprise in her eyes that he’d been looking at her, and he couldn’t help but think how much had changed in two weeks.

That first night she’d been afraid for him to see her naked, and now she gave him free range to her body. He had noticed it immediately, even later that night she had been more open and confident, but it had really changed last week.

That night before they told the boys had changed everything. In a way, it had changed nothing. It felt like a very natural progression, it hadn’t come out of nowhere. Yet he felt bound to her now.

It had been three years since he’d made love. He had never really called it that, but that’s what he and Jeyne did. He had noticed it early on in their relationship, how different sex was with her to with other girls he had been with in the past. They connected with one another. And sure the sex had been fun and hot and all the rest, but there was that _more_ to it with her.

Last Friday night he’d experienced that _more_ for the first time in three years and it had knocked the wind out of him. Never in his life had he felt like crying during sex but there was something so vulnerable and tender and _vital_ between him and Ella that he’d found himself holding back tears.

And now it was always there, between them. Even when he’d fucked her on the kitchen counter yesterday, he could feel it. That tethering.

He listened for the next minute or two as everyone wrapped up and he thanked them for their hard work and told them to have good weekends and then he hung up and raced up the stairs.

She was in bed, her head resting on the pillows, her feet on the bed and legs bent.

“Ella,” he groaned.

“Am I in trouble?” she asked.

He chuckled, “No. I’m sorry I kept you waiting.”

She turned to him and smiled, tucking her legs to the side, “I like hearing you work.”

“You do?” he asked.

She nodded, “It’s obvious why your team is so loyal to you.”

“Thank you,” he told her genuinely. And then walked towards the bed, “I’m still sorry, though.”

She blushed and bit her lip, “Are you going to make it up to me?”

“Hmm,” he pondered leaning over the bed and taking hold of one of her ankles, “And how would I do that?”

He dragged her down the bed towards him, grabbing her other ankle and pulling her closer to the edge of the bed as he knelt down on the floor.

He kissed one of her calves, “Any ideas?”

“Hmm,” she said, then teased, “Let’s brainstorm on that.”

He chuckled against her skin, tugging her legs until her knees hooked over his shoulders. He traced his index finger over her clothed cunt. She was soaked through.

“They’re all fired,” he promised her.

“Mr. Stark!” she admonished, and then he pressed a kiss to her through the lace and he felt her heel rubbing against his back, and she sighed, “ _Mr. Stark…_ ”

He moved his hands up and pulled her underwear down and off of her.

“These thighs of yours,” he appreciated as he kissed up them.

He could only focus on those for a brief moment before all of his attention was taken up by her glorious center. He loved touching her, he loved being inside of her, but he _loved_ using his mouth on her.

She was always at her most delicate, her gentlest, her sweetest when he used his mouth on her.

As though to prove it she let out a soft purr when he pressed his mouth against her folds. She was wet, and warm, and sweet, and he licked at her leisurely. She never rushed him, trusting him to take her over the edge.

Her back arched, her head and butt still against the bed but her chest rising, folding around him like a flower.

“ _Oh_ ,” she whispered.

He pressed against her more firmly and sucked on her pearl and she fell back onto the bed as her fingers stroked his hair, her calves rubbing his back.

He dipped his finger into her shallowly, and he felt her knuckle stroking his cheek. He looked up at her and found her looking down at him and he watched her as he sucked her pearl again, that pretty little crumble of her face.

His finger moved in her further, she was open to him entirely and he moved it in and out of her at pace with his tongue and lips.

Her breath had quickened, and her stomach had tightened and he should have rushed her towards it but lapped at her slowly, gently.

He looked up at her again and she smiled, a small, content smile and he kissed her reverently, groaning against her because she was too perfect for his own good.

She gasped quietly and he licked her more purposefully, quickening his pace with his fingers and sucking on her.

It was with his name on her lips that she came and her body moved against him like a wave was crashing over her. He kissed her thighs and her stomach and then stood up.

“You’re forgiven,” she smiled, her arms stretching above her head, all but crossing her legs.

“How forgiven?” he grinned moving to take his suit jacket off.

“Wait,” she pleaded.

“Do I have more groveling to do?” he teased.

“No,” she smiled and then sat up and got on her knees and crawled over to him. She raised herself up on her knees and placed her hands on his shoulders. His hands found her waist immediately, but when she wouldn’t look him in the eyes he moved one up so that he could nudge her chin up gently. He could see nerves but also desire in her eyes and his cock throbbed as his mind churned with curiosity. “Will you…”

“Yes,” he agreed when she didn’t finish her thought, nuzzling his nose against hers, “The answer is yes. Now what am I doing?”

She blushed but it seemed to give her the confidence to ask what she wanted to, “Keep your suit on?”

He tried to keep the surprise from his face, but he asked, “You want me to stay dressed?”

As though afraid she’d made him insecure she kissed him and promised, “I _love_ your naked body it’s just… you’re really sexy when you’re Mr. Boss Man.”

He could feel himself blushing and knew he was grinning at her like a fool, “Really?”

She nodded, squeezing his shoulders and kissing him. He kissed her back and she pulled away, but not too far.

“And being naked while you’re dressed in this suit feels…,” she trailed off, her eyes cloudy.

“Say it,” he pleaded, though he hoped it sounded more commanding than that.

That gorgeous blush painted her cheeks but she told him, “Naughty.”

He half sighed, half groaned, knowing he only got the gall from the look in her eyes, “You’re not naked yet. Finish undressing for me, Ella.”

She looked in his eyes as she reached behind her and unhooked her bra, and then shrugged out of it, letting the straps fall down her arms. She pulled it off, tossing it on the floor and revealed herself to him fully.

She didn’t look naughty. She looked perfect.

Any nerves there were ones of excitement because she felt comfortable and confident and wanted because of him and it made his heart ache that he could impact her so fully, as she affected him.

His fingers reached out and touched her stomach and moved up, rolling a rosebud nipple in his fingertips. They were peaked and her breasts were rising and falling with the force of her quickened breath.

“I don’t think I can stay _entirely_ clothed,” he grinned at her, tugging gently on her nipple, “Take it out so you can see how badly I need you.”

Her eyes were hungry as she reached out and touched her fingers to his chest, and then she smiled as she tugged on his tie so that his face was at eye level with hers. She closed the distance between them.

“Yes, Mr. Stark,” she said a breath away from his lips.

Her tongue touched his bottom one and he moved to kiss her fully but she was too quick for him and he got her cheek instead. He chuckled against her, but it died as a moan in his throat when she stroked him through his pants.

“Ella,” he pleaded, taking her cheeks in his hands.

She trailed kisses up his thumb, her eyes slowly raising to his as her hands moved to his belt buckle. Her entire body was before him and he was helpless to look anywhere but her eyes.

He felt the relief as she freed him from his pants and he watched as her eyes trailed down to take sight of him.

“Turn around,” he ordered.

She did more than that. She turned around and immediately dropped to all fours.

“You want it so bad,” he realized.

“Please,” she whimpered.

He would be lying if it didn’t stroke his ego, that he wasn’t just a little bit smug. But more than that he felt wanted. And appreciated, oddly enough. And special. And it was intoxicating, because Myrcella Martell was afraid to ask anything of anyone and she was begging him.

Like she wasn’t afraid to need him.

“I told you, Ella,” he took himself in hand and pushed into her folds, seeing stars by how wet and tight she was, “I’m yours for the taking.”

He snapped his hips into her and she moaned so loudly he was afraid he’d hurt her. He rubbed his hand up her back and she wiggled her hips against him in a way that made him nearly choke.

Content that she wasn’t uncomfortable, that she liked it, he rolled his hips out of her and then back in.

“Gods _Robb_ ,” she mumbled, burying her face in the bed.

It allowed him an even better angle and he gripped her slender waist in his hands and thrust into her, taking in every inch of her. Her golden hair lifting against her shoulder blades, her ass smacking against him as rode her.

“ _Ella,_ ” he moaned, “You _gods you feel good_.”

She moaned back but it was muffled and he was greedy. So greedy.

He lifted her by her waist until her back was flush against his chest, and he wrapped one of his arms around her waist and gripped her breast with the other.

He rolled his hips and she cried out.

“That’s it, Ella,” he said in her ear, his lips against the shell of it, “I want to hear you moan for me.” He thrust into her. “Those pretty little sounds you make play over and over again in my mind.” He kept thrusting and she kept moaning. He buried his head in her neck, “Your smell,” he wasn’t even sure what he was saying he just kept talking, “So sweet.” He rolled his hips and her head fell back against his shoulder, giving all of her slight weight to him, “This precious body. Right here, okay?” He was pleading with her now, his hips rocking now more than anything else, “Right here, with me.”

He wasn’t sure what he was asking but it didn’t seem to matter because she promised, “With you.”

The hand on her waist moved up and gripped her neck gently, feeling her quickened pulse under his fingertips. She was clenching around him with every thrust.

“Are you going to come for me, gorgeous?” he asked her.

“Yes Mr. Stark,” she cooed with a smile.

He chuckled against her cheek and kept thrusting again and again and again.

“Right now,” he told her, “Come for me.”

He thrust into her hard and it was like a bow snapped. She was entirely silent, the way she got when he’d pushed her past reason and he let out a moan as he shuddered inside of her.

Her arms lifted and she wrapped them around his neck, her back slumped against his chest. He wrapped his arms around her and kissed her shoulder and arm and cheek.

It was highly likely that he was going to smell like her all day. He could clean himself up but there would still be her lingering on his clothes and he liked it.

“Robb,” she said. He kissed her cheek in answer. “Remember how I said I know that you _can’t_ do this every day?” He kissed her again. “Can we do it most days?”

He smiled against her cheek, “Aggie does wonderful things with my calendar.”

She giggled, her body rubbing against his and tilted her face back. He lowered his lips to hers and kissed her softly.

Her phone started ringing on her bedside table and she winced, “That’s the school’s ringtone.”

“Get it,” he urged, stroking her arm briefly.

She crawled across the bed and hopped off, answering her phone, “This is Myrcella…” He couldn’t help but admire her. She looked good from every angle but she looked the perfect amount of disheveled. She must have felt him looking because she looked up at him and winked and then said into the phone, “Oh of course. No no I don’t want you to send him back to class, I’ll come get him…. I’ll be there in fifteen minutes. Yes, oh if you could that would be great…. Not a problem, thanks for the call. Yes of course, see you soon.” She hung up and pouted, “Poor little button.”

He winced as he tucked himself back into his pants and zipped everything up, “He sick?”

“Just tired, thankfully,” she admitted, “It’s those awful nightmares of his.” She walked away towards her closet still talking, “Do you know what he told me?”

“What?” he asked.

“That _nothing_ happened in the dreams, that he would just be dreaming totally normally and then he’d wake up and there would be this… _thing_ standing at his bed,” she told him, coming back into her bedroom as she was pulling on a pair of joggers, “How scary is that?”

“Really scary,” he agreed, “Do you think he should talk to someone?”

She disappeared again into her closet, but told him, “The pediatrician told me it is normal. But I don’t know,” she said coming back into the room and tugging a fleece pullover on, “Does that sound normal?”

“I don’t know,” he admitted, “Do you need help?”

“Yes,” she groaned.

He walked over to her and unzipped the top of the pullover so that she could pull her head through it.

“Most nights he’s okay,” she reasoned, going back into the closet and coming back out with a pair of socks and sneakers. She sat on the bed and pulled on one sock and then the other, “But the nights he has them. I’ve never heard anything like those screams.”

“Does he show any fear going to sleep?” he wondered.

She shook her head, “Only the night afterwards, but that makes sense, doesn’t it?”

“That’s the _most_ logical response,” he agreed.

“I’m sorry to just leave, but do you mind letting yourself out?” she asked, then smiled, “You can _snoop_.”

He chuckled, “Snooping will have to wait, because I also have to go, but yes, go go go.”

She lifted one foot so that she could tie her sneaker and he watched as she smiled, “I’m crazy about you.”

His heart swelled, “I’m crazy about you.”

She tied the other one quickly and then hopped up and walked over to him, pressing a gentle kiss to his lips.

“Oh!” she exclaimed as she pulled away. She didn’t explain further and just walked into her bathroom and came out a moment later holding a toothbrush still in its packaging, “I got this for you at the grocery store yesterday. Navy blue!”

As though the color was what made it great.

He laughed and took it from her, “Thank you.”

“I’ll see you tomorrow?” she asked.

“Can you come by around 10?” he asked.

“With bells on,” she agreed and then her eyes lit up, “You know the bells in the campus Sept date back a thousand years?”

“Did you pull out your old handbook?” he asked.

She tapped her temple, “Like an elephant, I am. Goodbye.”

“Goodbye,” he agreed, kissing her again.

“Will you text me to let me know they got in alright?” she asked.

He bit his lip to hide his smile, “Yes, and probably fifty times before then.”

“Okay,” she grinned, “Bye.”

She leaned up to kiss him and he laughed against her lips.

“Bye,” he agreed.

“Oh and tomorrow it is _important_ that no one wears red or _weirdly_ any fur? We don’t want a repeat of 2015…” she told him.

“Wait what?” he asked.

She grinned and winked, “I’m just messing with you.”

“Get out of here,” he chuckled, “You kook.”

“Okay,” she agreed and then kissed him three more times rapid fire and jogged away.

He watched her leave and shook his head and then went into her bathroom. He used his new toothbrush and her designer face wash and then did his best to smooth his hair which she had thoroughly disheveled. He knew he needed a haircut but he _loved_ feeling her tug on it.

He fixed her bedspread and then headed downstairs to the kitchen to grab his things. On the counter was a travel mug, also navy blue, that had not been there when he’d been down there earlier.

He walked over to it and saw that there was a note underneath.

_I also got this for you in the hopes that you’d come by for a refill (yikes) on Monday! Have a nice day Mr. Stark…_

He folded the note and put it in his pocket and then took a sip from the mug. It was hot and rich and probably entirely unnecessary given how awake he felt.

He grabbed his keys off the counter and then his phone, scrolling through until he found the name he wanted and pressed _call_. She answered on the first ring.

“Hi Aggie, it’s me. I’m heading in now, when I get there, can we take a look at my schedule? There’s some things we should permanently rearrange.”

***

“But no one can see it,” Cole complained.

“It’s too cold not to wear a jacket, baby,” she noted as she pulled down Robb’s drive.

“Can we put it _over_ my jacket?” he asked.

She smiled, “I don’t think it will fit, I got that for you when you were three and it was too big for you and now you’re nearly too big for it.”

He sighed as though she really was the most troublesome person on the planet. It was rare for him, but it always sort of entertained her when he did it. She could picture him as a teenager going through his sulky phase.

The root of his concern was that he was wearing his Trident University sweatshirt, the one that matched hers, but no one was going to be able to see it, because she in all of her motherly cruelty insisted that he wear a coat.

She parked in the drive behind Robb’s car and helped Cole out of his seat. He was clearly so excited to be here that he’d forgiven her and he took her hand happily as she closed his door.

Cole pulled her towards the front door and rang the bell.

They heard Grey Wind barking and a moment later the door opened and the saw Wes there.

“Hi!” he greeted them happily, looking at Cole, “Are you better?”

“So much better!” Cole agreed, “Today’s gonna be AWESOME!”

“Yeah _baby_!” Wes agreed.

They heard two different voices from inside shout, “YEAH _BABY_.”

“Come meet Uncle Rickon,” Wes pulled Cole inside. The pair of them ran down the hall and Wes shouted at her, “Hi Ella!”

“Hi sweetheart,” she smiled as she shut the door.

“Ella’s here?” she heard Robb ask and then he appeared in the hall, grinning at Cole and Wes as they ran by him. He was wearing a navy blue sweater and jeans and his grin widened when he saw her, “Hey darlin’.”

“Hi,” she smiled back.

She walked towards him and he took her cheeks in his hands immediately, kissing her lips. She let her body fall against his as she kissed him back.

“Are you going to be warm enough?” he asked.

“I have a hat in the car,” she promised.

“Always right where you need it, huh?” he grinned, taking her hand and pulling her towards the kitchen. “Everyone’s in here.”

_Everyone_ included Brynden, Theon, Cole, Wes, Grey Wind, but not Rickon and Lyanna.

“There she is!” Brynden exclaimed when she walked in.

She let go of Robb’s hand and crossed to him, pressing a kiss to his cheek. His eyes twinkled at her and she let out a shaky breath.

It was strange, because she hadn’t really been nervous at all to meet Sansa and Jon. It had been so early, before she could even admit to having feelings for Robb, so it hadn’t felt like such a big deal until she was in it and by then she was comfortable because they were wonderful. Brynden too she knew, and had spent time with before.

Rickon, though, was the first member of Robb’s family that she was meeting as his girlfriend.

Theon had sort of felt that way, too, but he was so outgoing and so frequently and thoroughly took the piss out of Robb that it was easy not to be intimidated by him.

He came over to her next and slung his arm around her, “You ready to trade up, yet?”

She glanced at Robb but he was looking at Theon with laughter in his eyes, shaking his head, “You’re a glutton for punishment, aren’t you?”

“One of these days she’s going to agree to run away with me,” Theon shrugged, “Chemistry like ours can’t be stopped.”

“Noooo,” Wes shouted from the counter.

She looked up at him and shrugged, “The boss says no.”

“So close,” Theon grinned, smacking a kiss on top of her head.

She smacked his stomach in return and walked over to the boys sitting at the counter. Wes took her cheeks in his hands as Robb had done and rubbed his nose against hers.

“Hey is she heooly shit,” a voice said from the doorway.

She turned and smiled, feeling oddly more confident with Wes still holding onto her cheeks.

“Hi,” she said as brightly as she was able, “I’m Ella. I’ve heard so much about you.”

Clearly having been raised by the same father as Robb, Rickon, all six feet four inches of him, bounded over to her like an oversized puppy and held out his hand.

“I’m Rickon,” he told her. “Gods you’re pretty.”

“Thank you,” she smiled, shaking his hand, “It’s so nice to meet you, Robb’s told me so many great things.”

Rickon was still shaking her hand and he gulped, “He um… you too…” then looked at Theon and said, “ _Wow_.”

“Dude I’m _right_ here,” a voice teased behind them.

She actually watched the color drain from his face and Rickon mouthed _help_ at her. She winked at him and then peered around his enormous frame.

“You must be Lyanna!” she greeted her, probably looking very uncool to this seventeen year old, “I’m so excited to show you campus.”

She was doll-like, almost, with dark brown hair and eyes and an adorable upturned nose. It made the snark in her voice all the more endearing and she looked effortlessly cool and at home amongst Rickon’s family.

The girl smiled at her shyly, her bravado gone.

“How was your flight?” she asked them, leaving it open to them both.

“Quick,” Rickon said.

Robb shook his head, “Because you slept the whole way.”

“Thank you!” Lyanna turned with a grin towards Robb and then informed him, “And _snored_.”

“Poor form, dude,” Theon lamented.

“At least I didn’t join the mile-high club,” Rickon noted.

“You told him that story?” Robb asked Theon.

“It came up naturally,” Theon shrugged.

“How?” Brynden asked, “How could that _ever_ come up naturally?”

“Because I brought it up _naturally_ ,” Theon grinned and pointed at Rickon, “Because it’s a great fu-“ she glared at him, “Nny story.”

Myrcella looked at Lyanna and said, “I’m going to need more coffee.”

Lyanna grinned at her, “So much coffee.”

“Let’s leave them to it, then?” she suggested.

Lyanna nodded and she turned towards Wes and Cole and kissed them both on their cheeks, promising to see them later. She waved at Brynden and then let Rickon and Lyanna say goodbye to one another.

“Are you all set?” she asked Robb.

“Yeah we’ll meet you there,” he promised, kissing her temple, then whispered, “ _She’s awesome, you’re gonna love her_.”

She smiled, happy that he did. And his tone suggested _that_ was what she’d be worried about, like the idea that Lyanna might not care for her was unfathomable.

Once everyone had said their goodbyes she started walking with Lyanna to the door.

“Oh hey, Ella,” Rickon said behind her, “Can I talk to you for a minute?”

Lyanna held up her phone, “I’ll just go call my sister. Bye Stark.”

“Goodbye goddess divine,” Rickon grinned at her.

She waited until the door closed behind Lyanna before she turned to Rickon.

“What’s up?” she asked.

“So,” Rickon said, “I’m not sure what Robb told you, but you know I’m going to school here in the fall?”

“He’s mentioned it a few thousand times,” she assured him, then couldn’t help but say, “He’s so excited that you’re going to be close by.”

Rickon blushed and grinned, “Me too. And… did he tell you that Lyanna was choosing between here and Vale and that I really want her to come here?”

“Yes,” she confirmed.

“Okay so, the thing is,” Rickon said, “On the tour… can you make sure to like…”

Her heart melted, and she promised, “I loved going to school here, I promise to paint it in a good light.”

He let out a deep breath and said, “Don’t.”

“What?” she wondered.

He closed his eyes, “I mean just be honest. You know um… if you didn’t like something or if the freshman dorms really suck or I don’t know if there’s some pervy professor or something, just be honest with her. Don’t… I want her here so bad with me, but I don’t want her to be if she’s not going to like it. You know uh… It would suck if she ended up hating me because I dragged her here.”

She narrowed her eyes at him, “You… are _just_ like your brother.”

“Robb?” he asked, a broad, pleased, smile on his face, “Really?”

She scrunched her nose and nodded, “Good to your _core_.”

“Are you obsessed with him too?” he asked her.

She tilted her head back and forth, “I prefer the term infatuated, but yeah.”

“Thank _the gods_ ,” Rickon grinned, “It’d be so sad otherwise.”

She giggled and patted his arm, “I’ll give her the real tour, promise.”

“Thanks Ella, see you later,” he said and then sprinted away shouting _hoo-rah_ that Wes immediately joined in.

She walked towards the door and opened it to find Lyanna standing in the driveway on the phone. Not wanting to interrupt she smiled at her and started walking towards her car, getting settled. She looked at the passenger seat and moved a drawing of Cole’s into the back and brushed the seat, making sure there wasn’t anything on it.

Lyanna opened the door a minute later and said, “Sorry.”

“Don’t be,” Myrcella said, “There’s a coffee shop on campus we can hit first if that works? Or is there something you wanted to see in particular?”

“Coffee’s great,” Lyanna confirmed.

Myrcella nodded and pulled her car around Robb’s and then out of the driveway. She got onto the main road and it wasn’t until she’d gotten onto the highway that she realized she hadn’t yet spoken. She wasn’t sure when it had become her default not to speak in the car, but she knew it had to do with Robb.

“Did this interrupt your day?” Lyanna asked her, “Like did you have something else to do?”

“No! Sorry Robb just doesn’t talk in the car so I think I just got used to it, I’m being so rude,” Myrcella lamented.

“What? No,” Lyanna argued, “I just mean… this is nice of you.”

“Oh,” Myrcella said, “I’m happy to do it. Really. Have you toured Vale?”

“Yeah, I went in the fall,” Lyanna confirmed.

“Beautiful, right?” she asked.

“So pretty, and I don’t know how to ski but I’d learn to get on those mountains,” Lyanna noted.

Myrcella smiled as she switched lanes, “Arryn is the best mountain I’ve ever skied. And it _is_ only fifteen minutes from campus. That was definitely on my mind when I was making my decision.”

“What made you decide Trident?” Lyanna asked.

“I came here,” she told her honestly. “And I don’t know, as silly as it is, I just felt it. It made me want to wear cozy sweaters and talk about important things.”

Lyanna could have told her that was lame but she said, “Yeah the whole thing does have a dark academia vibe to it. The pictures online make me want to dress like Ali McGraw in _Love Story_.”

Myrcella pressed a hand to her heart, “Such a great look.”

“Right?” Lyanna laughed, “My sister Dacey loves that movie.”

“Rickon _does_ look a little like Oliver,” Myrcella noted.

“Oh gods, are you saying I’m going to die of some rare disease tragically young?” Lyanna groaned and Myrcella gripped the steering wheel. “Oh… oh I am _such_ an idiot. I’m so sorry, Ella. I… Rickon told me and I can’t believe I said that.”

“Rickon told you?” she asked the first question that popped into her mind so that she could focus on driving.

“Yeah I guess he and Robb talked about you a lot over Thanksgiving and he told me, not to like, _gossip_ or anything, just because he was sort of… not _happy_ but… I don’t know how to say this,” Lyanna told her.

“It’s okay,” she promised, realizing that it was.

Her fingers had stopped shaking and her heartrate had steadied.

“I just think that Rickon was relieved that Robb was with someone who’d get what he’d been through, you know?” Lyanna told her.

“Yeah,” Myrcella assured her, switching lanes so that she could take the exit for the university, “That’s sweet of him, to worry about his big brother.”

“Worship, more like,” Lyanna informed her. “I’m sorry.”

“Thank you,” she told her and then said, “Don’t give it another thought. I can still swoon over Ali McGraw’s wardrobe even if I can’t watch the movie. You kind of have a Jenny vibe to you.”

Lyanna laughed, “That’s what Rickon said when Dacey made him watch it. When she’s mean to him in the beginning.”

Myrcella smiled as they got onto campus and the words seemed to fall right out of Lyanna’s head. All around them students were milling about. It was a Saturday morning and they were all in varying states of dress. Some were in workout clothes, others clearly walking home from parties the night before, others seemed to be begrudgingly heading to the library like they’d promised their parents that they would.

She parked the car and looked at Lyanna. The girl was peering around, taking in the streams running through campus and the little bridges over them.

“Everyone looks so smart,” Lyanna told her.

“I said the same thing when I came here, and guess what?” she asked. Lyanna looked at her and she smiled, “They _are_ , so you’ll fit right in. Come on.”

Lyanna peered outside once more and then opened her door so Myrcella did the same. The girl finally looked seventeen years old and it beckoned her protectiveness, remembering when she’d come here, younger than Lyanna was now. She placed her hand gently on her back and guided her across the street.

Lyanna was looking at everything, the architecture, the quad, the students. Guys were certainly taking notice of her and Myrcella fought the urge to glare at them or shoo them away.

She brought Lyanna to the cafe on the first floor of the library and they ordered drinks – vanilla latte for her, iced matcha latte for Lyanna which they _certainly_ hadn’t had on the menu when she’d gone to school here – and then she took Lyanna through the library.

Lyanna was curious about the funniest things, where her favorite study spot had been, if there was a certain stack where everyone liked to go to make out. It wasn’t necessarily the tour she’d planned to give, but it was way more fun to reminisce and remember all the things she’d loved about this place.

As they walked across the quad she tossed her empty coffee cup into the trash.

“So, do you know what you want to study?” she asked and then grimaced, “And a very appropriate answer to that is _no_.”

Lyanna smiled, “I think business. International business, actually. I’ll minor in High Valyrian so that I can work across the Narrow Sea. There are all these incredible start-ups over there focusing on female entrepreneurs and I’d like to help those women thrive in their communities.”

“Wow, so you know _exactly_ what you want to do,” Myrcella noted and Lyanna blushed, “I think it’s great.” She pointed across the quad, “The B school is just up here, I only took one class in it but it’s _beautiful_ because of course all the graduates of the business program are the best donors.”

“What did you study?” Lyanna asked her.

“Art History,” Myrcella smiled, “With a dual minor in literature and High Valyrian. You really need it for the primary texts.”

“Art History,” Lyanna smiled, “I’ve never even considered that, but I love art. Maybe I could take an elective or something.”

“There’s a great campus museum, too,” she told her, “And the art museum downtown is incredible… not that I’ve been in ages.”

“You should go,” Lyanna told her. Myrcella turned to look at her and she smiled, “You once chose to spend _four years learning_ about it. You should spend a few hours looking at it.”

Myrcella narrowed her eyes at her, “How did someone so young become so wise?”

Lyanna pretended to think about it, “Video games, probably.”

Myrcella grinned and noted, “Well _you know_ if you came to school here, you could be my museum buddy.”

“Could we wear all black and say things like _it’s really rather derivative_?,” Lyanna asked her.

Myrcella nodded solemnly, “We’d have to. They don’t let you in otherwise.”

Lyanna laughed and Myrcella grabbed the doors and they walked into the business school. Even though it was a Saturday, there were students littered about.

A couple of grad students stopped what they were talking about and looked at Lyanna.

“She’s seventeen,” she informed them, and realized immediately that was something that Robb would have done.

“Ella!” Lyanna admonished, dragging her away, “They were looking at you.”

Myrcella rolled her eyes, “I’m an old lady and they were definitely looking at you.”

“You’re _young_ and _hot_ and worse than Alysane,” Lyanna noted.

Myrcella had no idea who Alysane was but she couldn’t deny that had been a _little_ overeager. They looked through the building and Myrcella made Lyanna sit at one of the desks and she took a picture to send to Robb.

When they’d seen enough classrooms she brought Lyanna back outside and showed her the fitness center and rugby pitch and the theater.

It was nearing the time to go meet the guys at the game and she and Lyanna joined the crowd that was walking towards the stadium.

“Well?” she asked.

“I love it,” Lyanna told her, looking around, “I get what you mean. Vale is _beautiful_ but I don’t know, I didn’t really… feel it. The way I do here.”

Myrcella grinned, “That’s great. And you know, one other great thing about coming here is if you really are interested in international business, I’m _pretty_ sure you could get a pretty sweet internship.”

“Where?” Lyanna asked.

“With Robb,” Myrcella noted. “His company does all kinds of business across the Narrow Sea and they’ve got a whole venture capitalist division.”

“I don’t know,” Lyanna shook her head, “I mean, I’ve technically known him since I was a baby but I wouldn’t feel right asking.”

“Oh but haven’t you heard you’re under Robb Stark’s protection now?” Myrcella asked. Lyanna glanced at her and she smiled, “It’s a pretty great club. Next year we’re thinking of getting jackets.”

Lyanna rolled her eyes but smiled and shook her head, “That feels too easy. You know I follow my boyfriend here and then his brother gives me a cushy job. My sisters would give me so much shit.”

“Oh,” Myrcella said, realizing she’d just stepped on a landmine. “I didn’t mean to imply that you-“

“I know,” Lyanna waved her off, “It’s me, sorry. I just don’t like the look of it. And I just… my sisters are so strong, you know? Alysane’s raising two kids on her own and Dacey became a Mom for me overnight and I just don’t want to let them down.”

“Well seeing as how I’ve known you for all of three hours I feel very qualified to give advice,” Myrcella teased and Lyanna smiled, “But can I point something out?” Lyanna nodded. “We’re talking about Trident University and Tully Corp. These are opportunities thousands across this country would _kill_ for. It’s not like you’re throwing your life away for a pretty pair of blue eyes.”

“His eyes are so pretty,” Lyanna lamented.

“If Rickon wasn’t coming here, and it was still between here and the Vale,” Myrcella asked, “Do you think you could see yourself here?”

Lyanna looked around, “Yeah. I do. I _really_ do. I don’t know, I’m sure I sound so ridiculous. I’m sorry I just don’t know who to talk to about this. My friends all think I’m an idiot for giving it any thought at all.”

“What do you mean?” she asked.

“Oh you’re not from the North,” Lyanna noted, “The Starks are like a _thing_ there, and then you add in the fact that Rickon has been starring quarterback since he was fourteen and he’s practically a god at home. And all my friends acted like I was an idiot for resisting him in the first place and now that I’m considering not coming here they think I’m the biggest fool alive. Like they don’t even understand that his feet smell really bad or that he is _physically incapable_ – no Ella I mean _physically incapable_ of eating or drinking anything without getting it on him.”

Myrcella laughed, “Oh come on, he can’t be all bad.”

Lyanna smiled a lovelorn smile, “He’s not. I so wanted him to be, you know? I’ve known him since we were kids and he was always just there. Big and dopey and happy. Always so _nice_ to me. But he’s like this _thing_ there, this… you know _Rickon Stark_ and I just wanted to hate him because he’s so fucking hot. And then my Mom died. His Mom had died when we were younger and so when he was always just sort of around I couldn’t be mean to him because he got it, you know? Even if I wanted to act like he didn’t. And he just was this sort of wall. Like… he could just… I could just sit there with him. And he just got it. And it was like no one could come near me when he was around me. And after a while he started asking me out. I thought it was a joke. But he kept asking. And then one day he stopped. And I…”

“Hated it,” Myrcella guessed.

“Oh it made me _so_ mad,” Lyanna laughed, “How dare he after _months_ of rejection give up, you know?” Myrcella grinned sympathetically and Lyanna shook her head, “And I was driving home one day and I saw him out running and I pulled over to give him a piece of my mind, that boy looked so scared. And I asked him _Why did you stop calling?_ And do you know what he said?” Myrcella shook her head, dying to know. “ _My sister told me to._ ” Myrcella laughed and Lyanna grinned, “It was the cutest most infuriating thing I’d ever heard.”

“So you _had_ to kiss him,” Myrcella guessed.

“Had to,” Lyanna agreed. “I don’t know, maybe I should just trust him.”

“About what?” Myrcella asked.

“That he wants me here,” Lyanna noted, “That I wouldn’t be holding him back. I don’t want him to resent me.”

Myrcella smiled as it was clear that Lyanna Mormont and Rickon Stark were very well suited.

“Can I make one more observation?” Myrcella asked.

“Now that I’ve told you my life story, I think you’ve earned it,” Lyanna agreed.

“Coming to a school that you don’t want to because of your boyfriend is kind of lame,” Myrcella noted, “But _not_ coming to a school that you love because the boyfriend you also love is, is _really_ lame.”

“I never said I loved him,” Lyanna said hurriedly.

“No,” Myrcella smiled, “You didn’t.” Lyanna blushed and Myrcella wrapped an arm around her shoulders, “It’s okay. Just remember his feet smell.”

“But the rest of him smells so nice,” Lyanna lamented.

Myrcella laughed and then her phone started buzzing in the pocket of her coat.

“Hi you,” she answered.

Lyanna fluttered her eyelashes at her.

“Hi you,” Robb returned, “We’re here, where are you?”

“Just got here too, I’m by the flagpole,” she told him.

“The fl-oh okay do you see the giant fish?” he asked.

She laughed, “You mean the bronze one that’s a hundred feet tall?”

“Yeah, we’re right next to it,” Robb said.

“We’ll be there in a second,” she promised and then hung up.

She and Lyanna made their way over and found all of them standing there with a few surplus boys that looked to be the same age as Rickon and Lyanna.

Wes and Cole greeted her exuberantly and Lyanna stuck by her side.

Which Rickon was having none of. It would have been very easy for him to act cool in front of the other guys, but it seemed that Rickon Stark had no time for that.

“Hi baby I missed you,” Rickon came right over to her and picked her up. “How was your tour?”

“It was great,” Lyanna told him.

“How great?” Rickon asked.

“Like… let’s roadtrip down here together great,” Lyanna sighed as though she knew what was coming.

“HOO-RAH HOO-RAH,” Rickon shouted.

Cole and Wes joined in immediately.

Rickon turned towards the other boys and said, “This is my future sugar mama, Lyanna Mormont.”

The boys waved at her and Lyanna waved back casually, clearly used to being held by Rickon for long periods of time. Her face scrunched when Rickon started pressing kisses to her cheek.

“So what sealed it?” Rickon asked, “The cafeteria? The library?”

To her surprise Lyanna said, “Ella.” All of them turned to look at her and she could feel herself blushing. “She told me I was being lame.” She then looked at Robb, “You were right, I _love_ her.”

*

Trident had mopped the floor with Sunspear and though it had taken all of them ages to get out of there they had all had a very good time. Brynden and Theon had both cited dates for the evening so hadn’t joined them for dinner, and though she’d suggested to Robb that she and Cole didn’t need to crash, he’d insisted they come back to the house with them.

They’d ordered pizza and she’d helped the boys make brownies and they’d eaten around Robb’s dining room table. After dinner she and Robb had let Wes and Cole play for a while before putting them down in Wes’ room.

Given his most recent nightmare, she’d be bringing Cole home with her tonight, but he’d fallen asleep easily enough and wouldn’t be disturbed by Robb carrying him to her car later on.

“So wait a second,” she said as she settled onto the couch next to Robb after having gone to check on the boys. “Shouldn’t you be at some party right now with your future teammates?”

“So here’s the thing,” Rickon held up his hand.

Lyanna groaned and Robb shook his head.

“Oh gosh, what did I say?” she wondered.

“He has a _theory_ ,” Robb informed her.

“It’s been honed,” Lyanna noted.

“Shh shh shh shh, Ella will understand this,” Rickon informed them confidently. “So Ella.”

“Rickon,” she acknowledged him.

“The thing about those nights is that the seniors in high school are supposed to be all eager and whatever and end up drinking way too much and making total asses out of themselves, right?” he asked. She had no idea but it sounded plausible so she nodded. “Like Little Jon – he’d 6’7” Ella – he went on one of those nights when he decided to go to King’s Landing and to this day – he just got drafted – they call him Toilet Feet.”

“Do I want to know why?” she asked.

“Oh bec-“ Rickon started.

“No,” Lyanna informed her.

Rickon nudged her with his foot, smiling, and then turned back to her, “So by not going not only do I _avoid_ embarrassing myself, but I also look so cool because I literally just told them _sorry guys, I have plans. I’ll catch up with you in August_. So like as far as they know I’m out at some other party.”

She looked at him for a moment and then at Lyanna and Robb and said, “I’m sorry. What about that _doesn’t_ make sense?”

“Told you!” Rickon pointed at them.

“It’s so stupid,” Lyanna argued.

“And that’s definitely _not_ how he explained it to me,” Robb went on.

She waved him off and looked at Rickon, “I’m with you.”

“I knew you’d get it,” Rickon exulted, and shrugged, “And see, I can sit here, drink a few beers with you guys and have a lot more fun anyway.”

“Says who?” Robb asked.

“Oh come on, Robb, one more beer, between brothers,” Rickon noted.

Robb sighed and stood up, “Fine, but you’re not allowed to pull the brothers card for the rest of the weekend.”

“Deal,” Rickon said and then looked at her and shook his head.

Myrcella bit her lip but it was no help hiding her grin and Robb looked at her and smiled, “Do you want me to put the kettle on for you?”

“Yes please,” she agreed.

“Lyanna?” Robb asked, “Do you want something? Beer, wine, something non-alcoholic and age appropriate like hot chocolate?”

Lyanna rolled her eyes and then thought about, “Actually hot chocolate sounds good.”

“Yeah, screw the beer, hot chocolate fuck me UP,” Rickon agreed.

“Yeah, screw the tea, hot chocolate – nope, can’t do it,” she shrugged, lamenting, “I can’t pull it off.”

“You did great,” Rickon told her.

She laughed and followed Robb into the kitchen. She grabbed mugs out of the cabinet as he put a pot on the stove and poured milk into it.

The hot cocoa mix was in the pantry so she grabbed it and brought it over to the stove. She rubbed her hand up and down Robb’s back, leaning her cheek against his arm.

“You smell nice,” she told him.

“So do you,” he told her.

“He’s so like you,” she told him. “It’s kind of crazy. The way she talks about him. I don’t know.”

“She’s in it, huh?” he asked. “She’s not as exuberant about it as he is but she’s in it. Right?”

“She’s well and truly in it,” she promised.

He poured the cocoa mix in and stirred and she lifted his arm up so that she could hug him around the middle. One of his arms wrapped around her waist and the other cupped her head.

“Can I take you out on Thursday night?” he asked her. “Theon offered to babysit – both Cole and Wes actually. Though he and Cole bonded in a way I’m not sure you’ll support.”

She laughed, “I already made a list of words he’s not allowed to teach him.”

Robb chuckled and released her with one arm so that he could turn off the stove and pour the hot cocoa into four mugs, his other hand still holding her.

“Yes, I’d love to go on a date,” she noted. “What do you want to do?”

“Well… a little birdy told me that until she could get here next year, I should take you to the art museum,” he said, “And it looks like there’s a new exhibit opening on Thursday night.”

She looked up at him, “You don’t have to do that.”

“I want to,” he told her, “You’re going to have to explain _everything_ to me though.”

“Okay,” she grinned, standing up on her tiptoes and kissing him.

He kissed her back, placing everything down and lifting her off the floor. They’d kissed a few times today but nothing like _this_ , not since yesterday when he’d… she moaned into his mouth.

“So coffee, on Monday,” he cleared his throat, “Two cups, maybe?”

She laughed and kissed him once more and he set her down on the floor. They each grabbed a mug and walked back towards the living room.

“Oh!” she exclaimed when they walked in.

In her defense, Rickon and Lyanna were pretty heavily making out on the couch.

“Oi!” Robb shouted behind her, “Rickon Stark.”

Rickon sprung off of Lyanna, a dazed look in his eye. Lyanna looked embarrassed but very happy and wiped her lips and straightened her shirt as she sat back up.

“Hot cocoa?” she asked as brightly as she could.

She brought the mugs over to each of them, afraid that Robb would smack Rickon upside the head.

Robb sat down in the arm chair and she perched on the arm of it, accepting the mug he offered to her.

“Ella,” Rickon said, “Since you and I seemed to sort of you know, just be on the same wavelength, can I run something else by you?”

She blew on her hot chocolate and tried to hide her smirk.

“Go for it,” she said.

Robb looked up at her in horror and she nudged him with her foot. She was fully aware she was being played.

“Okay so, next year I’m going to be in college, right?” he asked her. She nodded. “And you know, my brother’s a great guy and all but let’s just say when he was my age he was no saint, okay?” She tilted her head to look at Robb and smiled at him and then turned back to Rickon, “So don’t you think it’s a little silly slash hypocritical that I can’t sleep in the same room as my girlfriend who I’m _devoted_ to?”

“Um,” Myrcella said before taking a sip of hot chocolate and shrugged, “I don’t think it’s hypocritical.”

She realized that her answer implied she did think it was silly. But she was okay with it, because she did think it was kind of silly. Respectable, even adorable, but silly nonetheless.

“But you sleep over here,” Rickon suggested.

“Well,” she said, “I did once. But I slept in a guest room.”

Rickon looked at her for a long moment and then turned to Robb, “Dude, what the hell are you doing?”

“Don’t you worry about what I’m doing,” Robb said, and she felt his hand on her back rubbing it, “Just shut up and drink your cocoa.”

She lowered herself into Robb’s lap and leaned her back against his chest as she started drinking her hot chocolate.

“He’s got a point, you know,” Robb said in her ear.

She smiled and said, “Oh I know, we’re on the same _wavelength_.”

“I mean it, Ella,” he told her, “Think about it, okay?”

She turned to look at him, knowing Rickon and Lyanna were in there only little world.

“You mean another sleepover?” she asked, a mixture of want and reticence.

She hated saying goodnight to him but she didn’t like the idea of leaving the boys again so soon.

“Yeah,” he agreed, “For all of us.”

It was impossible to keep the smile from her face.

“Us and the boys?” she asked.

“Yeah,” he smiled back, “I want to wake up with you in my arms and be attacked by Wes and Cole and Grey Wind. I want all of us. A whole weekend. Will you think about it?”

She wondered briefly if it was too soon, and then she thought about what she’d told Lyanna. That not doing something that you wanted, that could be so good for you, because you didn’t like the way it looked, was stupid.

“I don’t have to think about it.”


	24. Chapter 24

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> So this chapter is muuuuch shorter but I hope you enjoyed it!

“I like the museum,” Cole told her.

Her mouth dropped open, “You are so full of it.”

Cole smiled, “But I’m big now. Maaaaybe I’d like it.”

She grinned, “And you know what, baby? I would love to take you.”

“Tonight?” he asked.

She turned around and looked at him, “Not tonight. It’s almost your bed time.”

“But I’m not tired,” he told her.

She held out her hand and Cole got off of her bed and walked over to her. Myrcella pulled him into her lap and he leaned his head against her chest.

“What’s going on, baby?” she asked.

She had purposefully not booked any playdates that afternoon so that they could have time just the two of them. It had been cold but gloriously sunny and they’d bundled up and played outside before coming in and getting cozy under a blanket and reading book after book after book, switching off who was reading to who. They’d had a wonderful time, they always did, and she was hoping that it would make it easier when she left to go out with Robb.

“I just want to go,” he pouted.

She stroked his hair and down his cheek, tilting up his chin, “Is it the nightmares?”

He hadn’t had one this week but it was understandable that he’d be reticent for her to leave while he was going to be sleeping.

“No,” he scowled.

“Cole,” she chided gently.

“I want to be with you and Robb,” he told her, breaking her heart and then stomped on it when he told her, “I’ll behave.”

“Oh baby,” she sighed, kissing his forehead, “Remember we talked about this? Sometimes Robb and I will go out on our own.”

“I know,” he agreed, “But not tonight.”

She bit her lip to hide her smile. He didn’t have a poker face but he was one hell of a negotiator.

The thing was that she knew that if she asked Robb he wouldn’t even hesitate. He’d scrap their plans in a moment and sit on the couch with her and Cole and he wouldn’t even think to complain. It wouldn’t even occur to him that it wasn’t a wonderful way to spend a night.

But she and Dr. Dayne had talked about it and her therapist felt that establishing boundaries was important. That had prompted her to ask, rather rudely, whether Dr. Dayne had any children. It had been a knee-jerk reaction because she knew that Dr. Dayne was right. Rationally, she understood that the guilt she felt at leaving Cole for an evening was not exactly proportional to the situation.

She could remember sitting on the floor in her mother’s room while she dressed for some event or other. Never once had she asked to go with her, even though she had a whole closet full of party dresses. She could remember handing her mother a blush brush or an earring or a bobby pin, thinking that there had never been a more beautiful woman in the whole world.

She couldn’t help but wonder if her mother ever felt in her chest the pain she felt now.

“You,” she told him, “Are my favorite person in the _whole_ world to hang out with, did you know that?”

“Yeah,” Cole grinned.

She smiled at him, “But just like you go to school and see your friends, sometimes I should go out with mine. Don’t you think?”

“Yeah,” he agreed, but his smile was gone.

“You know who else loves hanging out with you?” she asked.

“Robb?” he guessed, his eyes perked.

“That’s right, baby,” she agreed, “We talk about you and Wes _all the time_ when we’re together. And sometimes when you two go off to school we miss you _so so_ bad we can’t think about anything else. But you always come home from school and you know what one of my favorite parts of the day is?”

“What?” he asked.

“Hearing all about the _great_ stuff you did,” she told him, “So how about tomorrow morning I wake you up a little early and we go somewhere for breakfast and I’ll tell you all about it?”

“Okay Mommy,” he agreed then looked at her, “You look pretty.”

“Thank you, baby,” she smiled at him.

“Robb’s here!” Lyla called from downstairs.

“Thank you! We’re up here, Robb!” she called back.

Though Theon had graciously offered to babysit Cole, given that it was a school night she’d decided that she’d prefer if Cole was at their house rather than Theon’s loft downtown. Thankfully, the offer hadn’t been mentioned to Cole otherwise she would have been having a very different conversation.

A moment later Robb bounded in the room. Her mouth went dry at the sight of him, wearing a turtleneck under his suit and the pair of glasses he always wore while driving at night. She wasn’t sure if he looked like a Boss Man or a Professor or _what_ but he looked good.

And he was holding a bouquet of peonies.

“Hello, hello,” he greeted them.

“Hi,” Cole greeted him, far less exuberantly than normal.

“Uh oh,” Robb sighed, crossing towards them and kneeling down in front of Cole, “What do we have here?”

“You know how _sad_ we get when we drop the boys off at school?” she asked and Robb’s blue eyes looked up into hers. “He’s dealing with a bit of that.”

She watched as understanding washed over him and then he focused his attention on Cole.

“It’s the worst, huh?” he asked him, “And think about me. I have to go to a boring old office every time I drop Wes off.”

“Ick,” Cole sympathized.

“I know,” Robb shook his head, “It’s terrible. So this is what I’m thinking. To make _me_ feel better, how about your Mommy and you come over for a movie night tomorrow?”

“With popcorn?” Cole perked up.

“So much popcorn,” Robb agreed, “And two movies.”

“TWO?” Cole asked.

“Oh. Yeah,” Robb agreed. “So, I’m going to think about which ones _I_ want to watch, and you think about which ones _you_ want to watch and we’ll decide tomorrow, okay buddy?”

“Okay,” Cole agreed.

“I have a secret to you tell you,” Robb told him.

Cole hopped off of her lap and leaned in and Robb cupped his hand over his mouth and started whispering. Cole started to smile and looked up at her and then nodded.

He took the flowers from Robb and then offered them to her.

“These are for you, Mommy,” he told her proudly.

“Thank you,” she smiled, taking them from him, “They’re _beautiful_.”

Cole turned to Robb and giggled, as though she’d fallen right into a trap.

“Not as beautiful as _you_ ,” Cole told her, making it clear that she had.

“A pair of flatterers,” she teased, before bringing the flowers towards her to smell.

The three of them went downstairs together and she put the peonies in a blue and white vase with water and put them on her kitchen table. They said their goodnights to Cole and Lyla and then Robb lead her by the hand outside.

“I’m sorry,” she said as soon as they got out there, “That you walked into that.”

“I’m not,” he told her and then amended, “I mean, I’m sorry that he’s upset but I’m glad you told me.” He stopped walking and she turned to look at him, “Do you want to scrap it? We can just stay here and hang out. I don’t want him feeling like I’m taking you away from him.”

“I think he’s actually feeling the loss of _your_ company more,” she noted and his surprised grin melted her even further. She stepped closer to him and looped her arms around his neck, “Do you have any idea how sexy it is that you’d ask that?”

“Sexy, really?” he asked, his arms wrapping around her.

She nodded, “You are so good for him, and how much you love my son and what a good father you are to yours are the sexiest things about you.” She looked into his blue eyes and felt a surge of desire and shook her head, “And that’s saying a lot, because I don’t know if you know this, Robb Stark, but you’re a _hottie with a body_.”

He chuckled, his hands wandering her back, “A hottie with a body?”

“I could use the phrase Lyanna and her friends use for you,” she teased, “A Certified D-“

“Do not finish that, I beg of you,” he said.

She giggled and pressed her lips to his. He kissed her back and then took control of it, wrapping her up tightly.

“I missed you today,” she told him.

“I know,” he sighed, leaning his forehead against hers, “I was grouchy all morning.”

She grinned, “You?”

“Oh I can be a real grouch,” he informed her, one of his hands wandering down and squeezing her butt, “Especially when I’m deprived of _you_.”

Deprived. Like she was a need.

“It’s good practice,” she lamented.

“Don’t remind me,” he pleaded, kissing her lips.

He and Wes would be leaving on Sunday to go up to Winterfell for the next two weeks. It was crazy that the winter holidays were already here, and she’d be leaving with Cole on Monday for their own trip.

“You’re going to have such fun,” she pointed out.

“I know,” he sighed, tucking her hair behind her ear, his thumb rubbing the shell of it so tenderly.

Even in the dark her heart sputtered from the look in his eyes. She was filled with a warmth in her stomach and she closed her eyes and tilted her face up to his. His lips met hers immediately and his tongue slipped against hers gently. She breathed him in as they kissed and it was him who stopped it entirely too soon.

“No,” she argued, kissing him again.

And then she was against his car and his hands were inside of her coat as though that was the permission he’d needed. He pressed hot, open mouthed kisses down her throat, to the hint of cleavage the dress provided.

“Robb,” she half gasped, half moaned.

He kissed back up her and she caught sight of his devilish grin before he kissed her lips again.

He pulled away and shook his head, “Look at you.”

“Am I a mess?” she asked.

“Not yet,” he told her, “But tomorrow morning you will be. I promise you that.”

Her knees buckled and she gripped onto his arms. His hands steadied her immediately and his mouth dropped open for a moment before recovering into a smirk and then sputtering out a laugh.

“It’s not funny,” she laughed.

“I’ve never actually seen someone go weak in the knees,” he teased.

She palmed his face, “I can’t even look at you.”

He kissed the heel of her palm and helped her into the car and then went around to his side. He pulled out of the driveway and onto the road. They were quiet in the car like usual as they headed downtown.

Rather than go to the highway he drove them along the river, and she relaxed against the seat, content as she always was when he drove her.

When they stopped at a red light she reached her hand out and stroked his hair.

He smiled and turned towards her, “Do you know much about the exhibit?”

“The curator was actually an adjunct professor of mine my last year,” she told him, “He won’t remember me but I just read the book he wrote while putting it together. It’s the first time the pieces have been exhibited together since their creation, which is sort of amazing. He detailed the whole treasure hunt.”

He smiled at her and then she saw the green light on his face and he turned back to the road. She dropped her hand and let him focus on driving.

They didn’t hit another red light for the rest of the drive, so he didn’t pick the conversation back up until he wrapped his arm around her as they walked through the parking lot.

“So, what’s he like?” he asked her, “The professor.”

She thought about it and said, “Brilliant. Unique. But brilliant.” She tugged gently on his lapel, “This is nice of you. I know it’s not necessarily your thing.”

“Well,” he smiled, “Not yet anyway. You can reform my heathen ways.”

She pressed a kiss to his cheek and as they got to the steps of the museum, his hand moved down her back and across it to take hold of her hand.

He gave their names and a docent waved them through. She opened her bag for the security guard and then they checked their coats and stepped into the lobby.

“My grandmother brought me here once,” he told her. “I think I was a brat about it.”

She narrowed her eyes, “Seems to be quite a theme.”

He chuckled, “I’ve decided you like me enough to know the truth.”

“What was your first clue?” she wondered.

He raised her hand to his lips and pressed a kiss to it, and his eyes lit up as she smiled and tugged him forward. The new exhibit was the entirety of the second floor, which they’d cleared out after being granted an enormous sum to undergo restoration, but the entire museum was open so she took him first to some of her favorite galleries in the east wing.

The first was a contemporary one and she smiled at the oversized campuses filled with rich swaths of bold colors.

She and Robb stood in front of one that was filled with red loops.

“Let me guess,” she grinned, “You’re thinking about whether Wes could have done it.”

He blushed and looked at her, “Is it that obvious?”

“Yes,” she laughed, “And it’s the usual response.”

“Not yours, though,” he guessed.

She shrugged, “I know that it’s not technically brilliant,” and then looked back at the canvas, “But it’s…”

“Sublime,” he noted.

“You’re not quite the heathen you think you are,” she grinned then looked around the corner, “Come on, I’ll show you some paintings of naked women.”

“I love art,” he teased and she was laughing by the time they entered the next gallery.

She delayed them getting to the naked women because in every gallery there was another painting she’d forgotten how much she adored. He was sweetly patient with her, asking her questions at some and just letting her look at others.

They got to the Baroque gallery with some of the lesser masters and she lead him to a nude and then went and looked at a highly detailed still-life that she remembered writing about for one of her classes.

“Hey Ella,” Robb called. She walked over to him and he pulled her in front of him, resting his chin on top of her head. “If I learn to paint, will you pose for me like that?”

She grinned and looked at the painting. It was of a woman reclining with her very large breasts exposed, casually reading a book.

She pretended to think about it and said, “If you agree to give me some of her… assets.”

He chuckled and wrapped his arms around her, “He only wishes he had a muse as beautiful as you.”

“There’s something I want you to see,” she told him. Taking one of the hands he’d wrapped around her she lead him back to the painting. “In the seventeenth century these paintings were an opportunity to show off your status. You can actually date paintings based on the different pieces on the table, if you know about trade routes –“

“As everyone does,” he teased in her ear.

She smiled, “Anyway. It was an opportunity to show how traveled you were, how wealthy you were, and how connected you were. This work is from the collection of Acorn Hall and look what’s on the table.”

She pointed to an opened scroll and Robb leaned in and grinned.

“A letter from Lord Hoster Tully,” he exulted, “That’s crazy.”

“He would have been the commissioner’s liege lord,” she noted, “So a letter from him would have been treated like one from the King. Old-fashioned name dropping. Kind of cool?”

“Really cool,” he agreed.

They went upstairs to the second floor. She’d have to find a time to come back when it was emptier, because well-heeled visitors littered about the room, only a few of them actually looking at the works.

“Where do you want to start?” Robb asked.

“I think we should go th-“

“Myrcella?” a voiced cooed at her, “Oh it _is_ you!”

She turned to her right and smiled, “Roslin, you look gorgeous.”

“Oh please I’m fat as a pig, but that’s what happy does to a girl,” she delighted, clutching her rail thin waist.

Myrcella accepted the kiss that Roslin planted on either of her cheeks.

“Do you know Robb Stark?” she asked.

“Of course,” Robb agreed, leaning forward to kiss her cheek, “Hello Roslin.”

“Pretty soon it will be _Auntie Roslin_ ,” she squealed and then showed them her hand and the enormous diamond on it.

“Oh it’s beautiful,” she lied, and then said truthfully, “My very best wishes.”

“I can hardly get anything done lugging it around,” she grinned and then pulled Robb to her side, “He’s a keeper Myrcella. You should have _seen_ the flowers he sent.”

Robb truly had no poker face because it was very clear that he’d done no such thing. Aggie was worth her weight in gold.

Roslin didn’t seem to notice though and started talking about the merits of destination versus local weddings, whether lilies were appropriate, and a hundred other different things.

“That’s a Tyrell, isn’t it?” she pointed at her.

Myrcella looked down at the dove grey dress she was wearing and nodded, “It is.”

“Marg really is the best,” Roslin used her nickname though she was pretty sure they’d never met. “Do you think she’d design my dress?”

“I’m not sure,” she told her honestly, “She’s such a perfectionist she only takes on five weddings a year…”

“Oh but she’d do it for you, wouldn’t she?” Roslin asked, “If you asked her?” Then glanced at Robb and smirked, “Unless you’ll be asking for some _other_ reason this year…”

“I’ll ask her,” Myrcella agreed, if only to stave off Robb having a panic attack. “No promises but of _course_ I’ll ask.”

“You’re such a doll,” Roslin grinned though she was already looking around, “Oh Eddy there you are.”

A handsome man in his mid-fifties sidled up to Roslin and handed her a glass of champagne, pressing a kiss to her temple.

“I’m sorry, lovely,” he told her and then looked at Robb. “You found my bride.”

“She found me, actually,” Robb noted. He took Edmure’s arrival to remove himself from Roslin’s grasp and he came over to her and stroked his knuckle down the bit of spine that was exposed by her dress, “Uncle Edmure, I’d like you to meet my girlfriend Myrcella Martell.”

Edmure turned away from Roslin and he smiled at her kindly, “Myrcella it’s such a pleasure to meet you.”

“And you,” she told him, offering her his hand.

He kissed it gently and she smiled as much as she was able while she felt Roslin’s death glare on her.

“Well now I see why my nephew hasn’t made it to the office before ten AM in two weeks,” he offered in a jovial tone.

She heard the dagger behind it and though it was in her nature to assume guilt she knew that it hadn’t been directed at her, rather at Robb. She stepped in front of him reflexively.

Robb clearly had no need of her protection and laughed, “Which is just about when you leave for your _networking_ lunches, isn’t it?”

Edmure laughed as well, as did Roslin so she smiled too, though she was sure they all found less humor in it than she did.

“That champagne looks so tempting,” she said to Roslin, hoping Robb would pick up her queue.

“Let’s get you a glass,” Robb said immediately, his hand moving down her back and applying some pressure to the small of it. “See you tomorrow, Uncle Edmure. Enjoy your evening, Roslin.”

“Lovely to meet you,” she said to Edmure.

“Call me about Marg,” Roslin said to her but she was already waving at someone else.

She let Robb guide her away.

“Do you really want a drink or was that your way of letting me know I was being an ass?” he asked her.

She laughed, “Both, actually.”

He chuckled and guided her towards the bar and requested two glasses of champagne.

“We don’t have to talk about it,” she told him.

“No, but we’re going to anyway, aren’t we?” he teased.

She smiled but touched his cheek with her hand because she could see the sadness in his eyes. He kissed the heel of her palm and then thanked the bartender and handed her one of the coupes of champagne.

“Robb if I’m getting in the way –“ she started.

“You’re not,” he told her and then looked at her fully, “You’re not. He’s just… I said no to another one of his ideas. It was in front of people and I shouldn’t have done it, but...”

“He shouldn’t have brought it up in front of people,” she pointed out. “He must know you don’t like to pull rank in front of other people and thought he’d use that to his advantage and slide it through.”

Robb stared at her for a moment and then nodded, “Yeah. That’s what Brynden said too. We’re just not one of those families.”

“I know,” she agreed, and he looked at her, “I’m from one of those families.”

He opened his mouth to ask her something but they were interrupted by an absolutely singular voice.

“Myrcella Baratheon?” he asked.

She turned and saw Varys, her old professor and the curator of the exhibition. It was unbelievable that he remembered her, he’d only taught her for a semester.

“Varys,” she smiled, “I’m honored you remember me.”

“I have an eye for talent,” he informed her and she felt her cheeks redden, “Please introduce me to your strapping escort.”

“Of course, my apologies,” she agreed, “Varys, this is Robb Stark. Robb, this is Varys, the curator.”

The fake smile was gone and he greeted him graciously, “Varys, wonderful to meet you. Ella here has been telling me all about your book, I’m going to have to borrow her copy.”

“You’re very kind,” Varys told him and then gripped his arm, “Kinder still if you buy your own copy.”

Robb chuckled, “Deal.”

Varys focused back on her, “Tell me child, what are you doing with yourself these days?”

She felt the familiar dread that she always felt when people asked her this question and she gave her standard answer, “Oh this and that.”

She felt Robb’s eyes on her and she averted his gaze and smiled at Varys.

Varys narrowed his eyes at her and said, “You read High Valyrian, don’t you?”

It was truly stunning that he’d remember something like that, considering she couldn’t remember ever telling him so.

“I do,” she agreed.

“Well if you have _any_ time between your this and that I could really use some help researching my next book,” he told her, “I’m going back in time and I have this whole _trove_ of primary documents. Letters, invoices, even you wouldn’t believe it, an erotic novel, and it’s mountains and mountains of it, most of which is in High Valyrian.” He turned to Robb and informed him, “You have no _idea_ how rare it is to find a research assistant who knows High Valyrian, these days. And this Ella of yours was researching at a PhD level as a mere undergrad, Robb I can’t tell you the joy of reading her papers.”

It was so much information to take in. She was horribly flattered but she hadn’t done any research since she was at Trident.

“That’s so kind of you to think of me,” she told him honestly.

“Look, my dear,” Varys said, looking around, “That little snot from the Times is here so I have to go make nice, but take this,” he proffered a card, “And when you’re back from what I’m sure will be a very glamorous holiday away, call me. I’ll have you for tea and show you the material and if it’s of interest, wonderful, and if not, we’ll enjoy ourselves anyway. Alright?”

She felt Robb squeeze her side so she took the card and said, “Alright.”

With a brief goodbye to them both, Varys disappeared. Robb turned her towards him and then both of his hands were on her waist, squeezing and wiggling her like he’d do to Cole.

“Goody-goody, smarty pants!” he grinned with an adorable scrunch of his nose.

She laughed and took a sip of champagne, “I can’t believe he remembered me.”

“Why?” Robb asked, then informed her, “You were researching at a PhD level as a mere undergrad.” She laughed and touched her hand to her cheek. “Ella you _have_ to do this.”

She rolled her eyes, “He just wants me because I know High Valyrian.”

“That’s not true and you know it,” Robb told her, “And even if it were, you stopped _breathing_ when he mentioned the primary documents.”

“I just love handling them,” she told him, pressing her hands to his chest, “It’s like stepping into another world.”

He stroked her cheek, “You should see your face right now, Ella. At least go meet with him.”

“I don’t want to give up my afternoons with Cole,” she admitted.

“So don’t,” Robb suggested, “Tell him what hours you’re willing to give. He just offered you the job after not having seen you in what? Eight years? Ask for what you want. He’ll give it to you.”

She grinned, and teased, “Is the Young Wolf going teach me the ways of negotiation?”

He chuckled, “If you want.” And then leaned his forehead against hers, “First lesson? Know your damn worth.”

***

Ella’s delighted giggle echoed into his neck, “No you didn’t.”

“We did,” he promised.

“You brought a reindeer into your pep rally?” she asked.

“Gods no,” he shook his head, “All those people, that would have been cruel. We used the pep rally as a diversion and brought him into my calculus class.”

She looked at up at him in horror and then her face crumbled and she let out a belly laugh, her body folding in on itself.

“You were very very bad,” she informed him.

He chuckled, “So the principal told me.”

Ella closed her eyes and smiled, leaning her head back on his chest and letting one of her legs drape across his. It was Saturday afternoon and they were in her living room as they’d been for much of the day, given the unseasonable thunderstorm outside.

The boys were upstairs napping and he and Ella had been hanging out and listening to music. He should have taken Wes home, so that he could get the house ready for them to go and do the last minute packing he needed to as they were leaving first thing, but he hadn’t had it in him to demure when Ella had offered to put Wes down with Cole. Another few hours with the two of them was worth him being a bit tired tomorrow.

Ella squeezed him tighter and nuzzled her face into his chest, causing warm molasses to run through his veins. He breathed her in, the floral scent of her shampoo, and her own sweet smell.

“Do you really have to go tomorrow?” she asked and he smiled against her hair.

“I don’t _have_ to,” he noted, “But when you left on Monday I’d be pretty sad.”

“That’s a good point,” she admitted.

He tilted her face up to his and was taken off guard by her beauty, even though he’d looked at her so often and so fully that he’d memorized the location of each of the freckles on her nose.

“I am going to miss you to the point of pain,” he told her.

Her eyes lit up and she smiled, “Me too. It’s going to be _awful_.”

“And yet strangely you seem delighted about it,” he noted.

“Well because it’s a good kind of pain, you know?” she asked. Her eyes searched his, “I’ve felt it for so long now, with you. This good sort of pain that comes from exerting things long out of use. You’re reminding my heart what it’s good for.”

“Ella,” he breathed out.

“You don’t have to say anything,” she told him.

He took her soft cheek in his hand and told her, “You’ve turned my world right side up.”

A rush of vertigo hit him as he said it, a violent flashback of telling Jeyne that she’d turned his world upside down on their fifth date.

She’d been afraid to ask him if he was seeing other people. Dancing around it at different points over the meal, he’d finally just gotten up from his side of the table and joined her on hers.

_“What are you afraid of?” he asked her._

_“You,” she told him. “Of falling for you if you’re not going to fall back.”_

_“I have been falling for you since the first moment I met you,” he said then, “I didn’t have a choice. You turned my world upside down.”_

He’d been in free fall ever since. But ever since she died, it was like he was suspended in midair, not able to make his feet touch the ground but having nothing to hold onto either.

So, it made sense, in a way. Even still it jarred him.

“Robb?” Ella asked gently, brushing his hair back.

“I’m sorry,” he told her, “It just… this is awkward, it reminded me of something with Jeyne.”

“It doesn’t have to be awkward,” she told him, her warm eyes looking into his, “You’ll always be in love with her. You should remember her often.”

“You don’t mind?” he asked and admitted, “When I started having feelings for you, it felt disloyal to her. And now, thinking of her feels disloyal to you.”

“It’s not,” she told him and sat up. He sat up too and she took his hand in hers, “I don’t feel any sense of… how do I say this?”

“However you want,” he promised, knowing this was not a conversation either of them had ever had and feeling like he didn’t have the words anymore than she did.

“I don’t feel competitive with her,” she told him, “I actually feel a kinship with her. And I know she was there first, and that she’ll be there always, and I don’t mind. I would never want you to push her out to make room for me in your heart. I want you to feel able to love her, and miss her, and remember her, without fear.” She looked at him and took a deep breath, “I know what I mean to you.”

“No, Ella,” he argued, lifting her hand to his lips and kissing her palm, “You…,” he raised her palm to his cheek and leaned against its soft warmth, “You have no idea what you mean to me.”

“Robb...,” her thumb stroked against his cheek.

“You don’t have to say anything,” he assured her as she’d assured him.

“I-,” she opened her mouth and then turned with a smile, “Hi sweetheart. Did you sleep enough?”

“No,” Wes yawned from the doorway.

“Oh noo,” Ella smiled, “Come cuddlebuddle.”

Wes walked over to the couch and Robb lifted him up, pressing a kiss to the back of his head before settling him in Ella’s waiting arms.

“Ooh you’re all warm,” she told him as Wes snuggled into her, closing his eyes, “Look at these cheekies. How did they get so delicious?”

Wes smiled with his eyes closed, a sleepy giggle leaving his lips, “I don’t _know_.”

Ella pressed kisses to his cheek and then looked at him, “Oh Robb you’ve got to try this.”

“This?” he asked, touching Wes’ cheek, which lifted under his finger as he smiled. Ella nodded and Robb leaned over him and pressed rapid fire kisses to Wes’ cheek. “Oh it’s too yummy, the baby’s too yummy.”

Wes shrieked with laughter and Robb pulled them both against him, greedily wanting them both in his arms.

Wes yawned but asked, “What are we talking about?”

Ella glanced up at him and he smiled at her and said, “Mommy.”

Wes turned around and opened his eyes, “Can we show Ella a video?”

“Oh…,” he said, glancing at Ella. She was looking at him like she was afraid to show that she wanted to see one. Like maybe he didn’t want to share her. “Okay.”

He grabbed his phone out of his pocket and went to his videos, scrolling up past the more recent ones, which were filled with Wes and Cole and Ella. He looked for one that he didn’t make much of an appearance in. In spite of Ella’s unbelievable, generous declaration, it felt too much for her to have to see him with Jeyne.

Choosing one he glanced once more at Ella and her eyes smiled at him so he pressed play.

And immediately Jeyne’s laughter filled the room, followed by Wes’ baby giggle. She was on a swing with him, holding him in her arms.

He looked from Jeyne to Ella, who also had her arms wrapped around Wes. Her eyes, which were glued to his screen had tears in them.

Wes looked up at her with a grin on his face and she let out a cry-laugh that tore his heart in two.

“She’s beautiful, sweetheart,” she assured him, when it became clear that Wes was asking a question.

Wes turned back to the screen until the end of the video.

“Thank you,” Ella said, “For showing me.”

“She loved me a lot,” Wes said, and then asked, “Right?”

He would have answered, but his son was looking at Ella.

“She loved you so much, with every bit of her heart,” Ella promised easily, knowing as only a mother could, “And she loves you still.”

“But she’s gone,” Wes explained gently, as though maybe Ella didn’t know.

“I know sweetheart,” she told Wes, but her hand reached for his, “But _that_ kind of love doesn’t go anywhere. It stays with us. We just have to remember it.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Okay so I *totally* had another conversation planned for these two in the second part of the chapter but then I started writing and this just came out. I had always planned, ever since them watching videos of Jeyne was first mentioned, that one day they'd showed Ella and it seemed to fit well in the moment.
> 
> I'd love to hear what you all think! It makes such a difference to know the story is being enjoyed. xo


	25. Chapter 25

“Do you want to undo your boots, baby?” she asked Cole as they settled into their seats.

“Yes please,” he said, lifting his feet and placing them on her knees.

She unbuckled his ski boots, picking out a few pieces of snow from the buckles and then lowered his boots to the ground.

“Oh isn’t it _glorious?_ ” she asked, leaning back in her chair and tilting her face up towards the sun.

“Glorious,” Cole agreed as he did the same.

She hooked one of her legs around a leg of his chair so that he wouldn’t tilt backwards and then returned her attentions to the sun.

“West Mountain or East Peak after lunch?” she asked.

“East Peak, I wanna go down Trooper again,” he told her.

She couldn’t help but smile about that. Trooper was a Black Diamond that Cole had been psyching himself up for in the weeks leading up to their trip. He was an incredibly advanced skier for his age. She’d taught him the winter he’d learned to walk, and by the next year he was on Blue Squares. Last year she’d let him on the easiest of the Black Diamonds and they’d gone up and down and up and down for the space of an entire afternoon, as he’d deemed all the other trails boring.

It wasn’t just that he could get down the mountain, either. He was a beautiful skier. Even without poles, which she was thinking he’d be ready for next year, he had total control, and he moved in elegant patterns that belied his age.

That was something he’d gotten from her, she knew.

Trystane had been a tremendous, powerful skier. He attacked the mountain, and could make it down in half the time it took her. He could spend an afternoon doing jumps and still dance that evening, and had even heli-skied a time or two.

She, on the other hand, had always been a _pretty_ skier.

Cole had inherited her style and Trystane’s daring and it really was a sight to see.

“Alright, Trooper it is,” she agreed, “We’re going to need our energy, what are you thinking today?”

She looked up and saw Cole smiling ear to ear. It made her smile too.

“What is it?” she wondered.

And then she felt her chair tip back. She looked up into a pair of blue eyes.

“GENDRY!” she cried, fighting to get out of her chair. He let her up and then she launched herself at him. “What are you doing here?”

His burly arms wrapped around her, “I finished up a project early and decided to crash.”

“You’re not crashing,” she reminded him, “We invited you I just didn’t think you’d come.”

He squeezed her tightly and then set her down and lifted Cole out of his seat by his ski suit.

“Tell me you missed me,” Gendry ordered.

“NOOO,” Cole giggled.

“Tell me,” Gendry grinned, cradling Cole in his arms and then started walking towards the balcony, “Tell me or you’re going over!”

“I MISSED YOU,” Cole squealed, not even bothering to hold onto Gendry.

“Okay then,” Gendry said and settled back into Cole’s seat with her son in his lap.

He was wearing black ski pants and a sweatshirt and his snowboarding boots. No helmet, no jacket, and his mittens were in his pocket.

“Did you know about this?” she asked Cole.

“No,” Cole promised, “But I hadda feeling.”

“Oh you just had a feeling?” she grinned then looked at Gendry, “How did you know where to find us?”

Gendry rolled his eyes, “It’s noon, which means you have another hour and forty minutes until you bring this little monster back for his nap. Where else would you be?”

“Am I really that predictable?” she asked him.

“Yes,” Gendry and Cole answered in tandem.

She tried to scowl at them but she was too excited for her lips to do anything except smile.

Her and Cole had arrived a few days earlier and had been having a wonderful time. The weather had been gorgeous, sunny and cool without being too cold. They’d been splitting their time between skiing and watching movies and swimming in the pool that Trystane had heated when she noted one time that it was a waste to have it when they were only ever there in the winter.

For most of the season she rented the house out, but always kept these two weeks free. She knew that she could sell and just rent a house for the two weeks they wanted to use it, but it was in such a desirable area that renting it for a single week took care of the upkeep for practically the entire year, and she and Trystane had always loved it so much that she didn’t have it in her to let it go.

Cole loved it here too. He’d stayed awake the whole flight and been chattering non-stop on the car on the way to the house. The first day she’d pushed his naptime until three o’clock because they’d both been so excited to be back on the mountain, and he’d woken up from it, eaten dinner and then promptly fallen back asleep. She’d followed about fifteen minutes later.

So if it had just been the two of them for the next two weeks, it would have been an excellent vacation. Gendry here, though, made it feel well and truly like a holiday.

“Did you leave your things at the house?” she asked.

“Yeah I still have the key from when I came hiking over the summer,” he noted. Then grinned, “Pretty foolish of you not to ask for it back.”

She smiled and grabbed her sunglasses out of her pocket, “Maybe _this_ is what I had in mind when I didn’t.”

“Have you guys ordered?” he asked. She shook her head and he patted his stomach, “Good because I’m feeling a burger.”

“Me too,” Cole said.

“Me three,” she realized.

“Alright, I’m buying,” Gendry got up, and pointed at Cole, “Arnold Palmer?” Cole nodded and then Gendry looked at her and she did too. “With a little bit of vodka?”

She laughed, “Not for me, thanks.”

Gendry left them at the table and Cole turned around in his seat and got up on his knees and watched him. She took her phone out of her pocket and snapped a picture.

It was a gorgeous shot. The sun was hitting him just so, and the sky was blue and the mountains impressive behind him. He was turned enough that you could catch the hints of a worshipping smile.

She texted it to Robb with the caption _Happiest camper got even happier, one guess why!_

Before she’d even put the phone down it buzzed with his response.

RS: _He made it down Trooper?!_

She couldn’t help but smile that Robb knew the name of the trail. Cole must have told him because she certainly hadn’t.

MM: _He did… but that’s not why._

RS: _I’m stuck at the edge of my seat over here._

RS: _(also please give him a high five for me)_

Gendry was heading back to the table and she snapped a picture of him and sent it off to Robb.

RS: _Woah! Was not expecting an Uncle Gendry sighting._

MM: _Me either!!_

RS: _It is proof how much you love him that he is allowed to surprise you._

MM: _I’m not that bad…_

RS: _Yeah, darlin, you are._

MM: _Says the man who blocks time in his calendar for… coffee_

RS: _You like to plan, I like to prioritize._

Her stomach warmed at that and she couldn’t help but smile to herself. Robb, like Cole and Gendry, might make fun of her for being predictable but he liked her all the same.

Gendry settled back into his seat and Cole was telling him about how he’d gone down Trooper and then they were debating the merits of East Peak versus South.

“How long can you stay?” she asked as they all tucked into their burgers.

“About a week,” he told her, “If that’s cool.”

“That’s cool,” Cole confirmed as he munched on a fry.

Gendry smirked at her when she held her hand out as though to say _the prince has spoken_.

“You know what we have to do before we get back on the slopes?” she asked them as Gendry was finishing off the half of burger she’d left on her plate.

“I don’t have to go to the bathroom,” Cole told her.

“Okay that’s fine but we’re still going to try,” she told him.

Last year they’d been on the chairlift which had then stopped because of some sort of problem at the top. They’d kept themselves occupied, giving names to the different mountains all around them, but after about fifteen minutes poor Cole had to go to the bathroom _badly_ and when they’d been held up there for another twenty he hadn’t been able hold it.

He’d been so embarrassed that she’d considered peeing in her own pants to make him feel better, and ever since then her rule was that _no matter what_ he had to try.

“But _actually_ ,” she said, “We’ve got to get Uncle Gendry a helmet.”

Gendry opened his mouth to protest but she looked meaningfully at Cole who worshipped him and wanted to be just like him and Gendry nodded with a bit of a scowl.

“Yeah, how stupid of me to forget it,” Gendry intoned.

“Well, what are little sisters for?” she sing-songed.

The truth was, even if Cole wasn’t there she would have insisted. He might not have acquiesced as easily, but he would have been worn down in the end. Not wearing a helmet was just plain stupid and she had very little sympathy for him wanting to look cool in front of the other snowboarders. Most of whom wore helmets nowadays anyway.

They cleared their things from the table and she rebuckled Cole’s boots before taking him to the bathroom and then heading to the small ski shop inside. Gendry spent three and a half seconds choosing a helmet and then he and Cole spent ten minutes choosing the right stickers to put on it and then the correct placement of said stickers, before they all headed towards the chairlift line.

Given that it was the holidays, the lines were pretty long, even in the reduced line their tickets allowed them to be in, but Gendry staved off Cole’s impatience by acting incredibly impatient himself, huffing and puffing and groaning dramatically.

When it was there turn, she and Gendry got on Cole’s either side and lifted him up onto the seat in between them as the chairlift scooped them up.

As the chairlift started climbing the mountain, Gendry tipped his face up towards the sun and said, “This is glorious.” 

Cole looked up at her and giggled and she patted Gendry’s arm that he’d spread out across them both.

It meant so much to her that he’d use his time off to spend with them. That he used so much of his time off to spend with them. He was a single guy in his thirties with no kids, no responsibilities except his job. He loved to have a good time, loved to travel to places he’d never been.

And yet more often than not, he chose some place familiar with them whenever he got the chance.

“Can we push naptime?” Cole asked.

“Let’s see how we do, baby, alright?” she suggested.

“Wow,” Gendry looked at her and she glanced at him, “So spontaneous of you.”

She laughed, “I’m not that bad!”

“Yes, you are,” Gendry grinned, “It’s cool, we love you anyway.”

She scowled at him before tilting her face back up towards the sun. It was true that she was that bad. She’d always been like this, wanting a plan. Wanting the lay of the land.

It was hard not to crave it, after having grown up not knowing where anyone was going to be at any given time. Sometimes she would look at her nanny at breakfast and ask where one of her parents were, only to be informed that they’d left for a trip the night before.

They always came home with a present for her and one for Joffrey and Tommen. Never an explanation though, about why they’d left or been gone for as long as they had been, or why they hadn’t called once the entire time.

It had turned her into a planner, to put it kindly, a control freak to put it more accurately. It was so a part of who she was now that even understanding the cause of it, as Dr. Dayne had forced her to do, hadn’t tempered it.

This was who she was and if the men in her life wanted to tease her about it that was fine with her, because they saw it, saw her, and they cared about her anyway.

Dr. Dayne had forced her to see that, too.

They got off the chairlift and headed towards Trooper. It was getting busy and she stuck close to Cole, not liking the way some skiers had a tendency to get too close to others on the mountain. She’d always hated it, feeling the same way she did when someone tailgated her on the highway, discomfited by their presence and yet guilty too, fearing she was holding them up. That was nothing compared to the blind rage she’d felt once when a grown man had done it to Cole.

They made it down easily and then Gendry convinced them to take the connector trail that would lead them to South. The South Peak had some of the prettiest trails on the whole mountain. Wide open and sun drenched, steep enough to be interesting but not so much that you couldn’t enjoy your surroundings at the same time.

The lines were quicker here and the chairlift newer and therefore faster so they made it up and down a number of times, getting in four runs in the time it would take them to do two on the East Peak.

At 2:15 Cole started to yawn as they waited in line so she said, “Alright guys, I think this should be mine and Cole’s last run for the day.”

“Gahhh Ella,” Gendry spit. “You never call last run. Spit, quickly.”

“I’m not spitting,” she argued.

“I will,” Cole said and did just that.

Gendry pointed at him and then looked at her, “A team player.”

She rolled her eyes and then stepped forward and waved at the now familiar ticket checker as she waved them through.

When they got up to the top they went to the trail aptly named _My way home,_ which the new owner of the ski resort had reportedly renamed so that he could tell his wife just that anytime he was on it. It was in fact the way home to her ski-on, ski-off house and she and Cole knew it well.

There were a group of skiers on it, a big cluster and she lead Cole over to the other side of the trail to give them a wide berth as they joked around.

They were making their way down and she was so focused on that group and on keeping Cole away from them that she hadn’t felt the other skier coming up quickly, far too quickly, behind her, so when he cut right in front of her it took her by surprise.

She overcorrected, as she didn’t want to bash into Cole in her effort to get out of the way, and her ski caught.

She felt her boot pop out of the binding, and heard Gendry shout, and the last thing she thought before she started to tumble was that he was right.

It really was bad luck to call last run.

***

“How!?” Rickon all but shouted at him. “How are you so bad at this?”

“Because I don’t give a shit?” Robb suggested, gesturing with his video game controller.

“Unacceptable,” Rickon argued, “I’m teaching Wes when he wakes up from his nap. Then _he’ll_ explain it to you.”

Robb chuckled and dropped the controller on the couch and leaned back. He had no doubt that Rickon would teach Wes or that his son would then be able to teach him. Wes was like a sponge, and it felt like every day there was something he knew how to do. _Look Daddy_ had become one of his favorite phrases, which was good, because he heard it often.

Rickon switched to single player and Robb watched the screen as his brother blew something to smithereens. Video games had changed a lot since he was in high school, but even then he’d never really been that into them. The idea of being inside and sitting down for hours on end hadn’t appealed to him.

Bran had always loved them and it was one of the few hobbies that he and Rickon had in common. They were best friends but there were very few things they actually enjoyed doing together, and he Sansa and Arya would call them the _odd couple_. Them being vaguely annoyed by but resigned to that that nickname was one of the other things they had in common.

At seventeen and twenty, his younger brothers were as close friends as they had been as four and seven and seven and ten. Though they had almost the same age difference between them as Arya and Sansa, they had never gone through what they all referred to as the Dark Ages that had spanned Sansa’s 11th-18th years in which she and Arya couldn’t be in the same room as one another without arguing. It had all changed when Sansa went off to school. Being left at home with her two younger brothers had endeared Arya to her girlier big sister, and being away from Arya had endeared Sansa to her.

He’d always gotten along with all of them, though sometimes when they were all together he felt like he had more in common with his Dad or Uncle Benjen than he did with them. He loved them, dearly, and enjoyed spending time with all of them, he just wasn’t always positive they were speaking the same language. Thankfully Sansa and Jon, in spite of seeing them all more often, felt the same way.

“Oh dude,” Rickon said as something on screen exploded, “Did I tell you Lyanna got into Trident?”

Robb grinned, “No but she texted Ella and _Ella_ told me. That’s awesome. She should be expecting a sweatshirt any day now.”

Rickon looked at him, “You didn’t have to do that.”

“It’s a tradition,” Robb noted and shrugged, “But I didn’t. Ella had one primed and ready to send as soon as they got back from their tour.”

Rickon grinned and dropped his controlled on the couch, tucking his bare foot up underneath him. It was snowing outside, not the sort that you could go out and enjoy either, and Rickon had never changed out his pajamas even though it was nearing dinnertime. In his oversized t shirt and flannel pajama pants he looked as young as Wes. It was hard to believe he was going off to college in the fall, especially with a girlfriend.

“She’s _obsessed_ with Ella,” Rickon told him, a small smile on his face, “The whole trip back she was telling me all the things Ella had shown her on the tour. I sort of wish I’d gone but I dunno, maybe it’s good I didn’t.”

Robb had been feeling the same way. Their day at the school had revived Ella’s love for it, and she’d dropped Cole off at school one morning wearing her sweatshirt, her hair up in a perky ponytail, looking scarcely older than an undergrad herself.

She also adored Lyanna, the two of them had exchanged numbers and Ella had called him overjoyed when Lyanna had gotten in.

He would have liked to see campus with Ella, and hear about her time there. He knew it was condensed. She’d gone early, when she was only seventeen after having skipped a grade and had finished after three years. It sounded like she’d still had her share of fun though, perhaps not exactly the same way he had fun in university, and clearly had loved it enough to stay in the Riverlands.

But he also knew that Ella and Lyanna having that time had probably convinced Lyanna of her decision in a way that would have been hindered by his or Rickon’s presence.

“El adores her,” he agreed. Then thought about it, “Though… between you and me, I’d watch out for Cole.” Rickon glanced at him and he said, “I think she’s his first official crush.”

Rickon grinned, “Kid’s got taste.” Then shook his head, “He’s so fucking funny.”

“I know,” Robb nodded, “He’s got shtick.”

“So uh,” Rickon grabbed a pillow off of the chair beside him and hugged it to his chest, “I’ve got Spring Break in April.”

“People still head to the Summer Isles for that?” he asked.

He hadn’t been able to go his Senior year because of lacrosse, but the stories people had come back with had been pretty legendary. Rickon didn’t play a spring sport, focusing solely on football, and over the summer had mentioned the plans people were tossing around.

Rickon nodded, “Yeah a whole crew is going down. But uh, Lyanna and I were thinking of coming to you. If that’s cool.”

“Really?” Robb asked.

He nodded, “Yeah her friends are all going to Qarth but it’s way too uppity for her and I don’t know… I don’t know the idea of dragging her down to the Summer Isles to hang out with a bunch of people she only tolerates for my sake seems so unfair.”

“You could go on your own,” Robb pointed out.

Rickon looked at him like he was insane, “Why would I do that?”

“Because they’re your friends and have been since kindergarten,” Robb suggested, “And this is one of the last times you’ll all be together.”

“You didn’t go your senior year,” Rickon noted. “Do you regret it?”

Robb smiled in defeat and shook his head, “I’ve never regretted something less.”

“So?” Rickon asked, “I mean if we’ll be in the way…”

“No absolutely not,” Robb shook his head, “Wes has a break in March, not April, so he’ll still have school and I’ll have to work but could probably take a couple of days. We’d love to have you.”

“Sweet,” Rickon agreed, pulling out his phone and texting rapid fire. He grinned and said, “Lyanna says that maybe she’s starting to like you after all.”

Robb chuckled, “Wow, I’m flattered.”

Rickon grinned, “You should be. That’s high praise coming from her.”

“You’re still not sleeping in the same room when you visit,” he warned. “So you guys’ll just have to find some other place to, you know.”

“Trust me, dude,” Rickon typed away on his phone before putting it next to him, “That is not the problem.”

“I don’t actually need to hear about it,” Robb teased, “You could call Theon for that.”

Rickon picked up his phone as though to do just that and then dropped it with a grin, “No uh, I mean we’re not having sex so.”

“Oh,” Robb said stupidly, because that was unexpected. He had just assumed. “Sorry.”

Rickon looked at him like he was insane once again, clearly thinking he was apologizing for him not having sex rather than for assuming that he was.

“It’s cool,” he shrugged, “She’s not ready so.”

Robb nodded and told him honestly, “I’m glad she’s comfortable telling you that.”

“She didn’t have to tell me,” Rickon amended and Robb looked at him. His little brother ran his hand through his shaggy hair and said, “I mean I’ve had sex before. A lot, actually… it’s pretty easy to tell the difference between a girl that wants to have sex and one that doesn’t.”

“Yeah,” Robb agreed.

“Why are you smiling?” Rickon asked him.

“I’m not,” Robb said though he realized he was. He shrugged, “I just like who you are, that’s all.” Rickon blushed. “And I like you two together. But uh… why are you so eager to sleep in the same room with her if you’re not having sex?”

“Because saying goodnight to her _sucks_ ,” Rickon lamented, “She’s my favorite person. I don’t know what she’s done to me, but when I drop her off at her house and she gets out I’m like… chasing her to her door. And I just want _once_ not to have to do that. You know?”

Robb thought about all the times he’d kissed Ella goodbye. Even before they’d kissed, when he left her house or she left his, or they waved to each other as they got into their cars dropping the boys off, he felt this twinge. This horrible twinge, this wanting. To say one more thing or get one more smile or _something_ , anything to prolong it.

“Yeah, Rick,” he agreed, “I know. And I’ll think about it.”

“Really?” Rickon asked.

“Think about it,” Robb repeated.

Rickon looked at him and said, “I feel like we should get Ella’s take on it.”

“You’re just saying that because you think she’ll take your side,” Robb noted.

Rickon didn’t try to deny it, “I know an ally when I see one. Come on call her.”

Robb rolled his eyes but pulled his phone out of his pocket. In truth, he was as eager as ever to talk to her so it was nice to have an excuse. Not that she’d ever made him feel like he needed one.

He dialed her and put it on speaker phone and she answered on the second ring.

“ _Hello gorgeous_ ,” she answered in a voice that made his blood start pumping.

Rickon clearly noticed and his mouth dropped open and Robb cleared his throat, “Hi yourself. How are you?”

“ _I’m doin good baby how you doin?”_ Ella giggled.

“She’s wasted,” Rickon chuckled. “Of course she’d be a cute drunk.”

Robb nudged him with his foot and asked, “El, are you drunk?”

It wasn’t like her to overdrink in the slightest, but Gendry was there so maybe he’d convinced her. If anyone could it would be him.

“Noooo,” she argued in such a way that he thought maybe she was. “I don’t _think_ so. It’s just the pills.”

“The pills?” Robb asked.

Before she could answer he heard her saying something to Gendry in an adorably haughty tone and then a minor scuffle and then it was Gendry on the phone.

“Robb? Sorry dude, I thought I had her phone,” Gendry said by way of greeting.

“That’s uh, I called her but wait why is she on pills?” Robb asked.

He couldn’t imagine Ella ever doing them recreationally.

Gendry sighed and said, “So she had a bit of an accident skiing today. She’s absolutely fine though.”

He didn’t think Gendry would lie to him but even still his blood ran cold and he found himself standing rather than seated, taking Gendry off of speaker and holding the phone to his ear.

He asked, “What happened?”

“Some absolute _dipshit_ was showing off for his friends and cut her off, like I can’t believe he didn’t touch her he was so close, and she tried to get out of the way without ramming into Cole and her ski caught and she wiped out,” Gendry explained. Then admitted, “My heart fucking stopped, but she was wearing her helmet and her skis came off so she didn’t get any major injuries or anything.”

“So why is she on pills?” Robb asked.

“She bruised her tailbone,” Gendry told him and then chuckled, “And her ego, most of all. But these aren’t like… they didn’t give her Vicodin. She’s essentially taking baby aspirin but she weighs three and a half pounds so her body is reacting like she was given a horse tranquilizer.”

Robb heard someone laugh but it wasn’t Gendry. He turned around and Rickon was hovering next to him, listening to the call.

“What are you doing?” he asked him.

“You took it off speaker!” Rickon noted.

Robb looked at him and then back at the phone and then him again and then put Gendry back on speaker.

“Sorry my little brother is here,” Robb told him.

“Is she really okay?” Rickon asked.

Gendry was silent for a moment and then said, “Yeah she’s fine. She was really lucky. Both that she didn’t hurt herself more and that I was so scared I didn’t think to film it. Have you guys ever seen The Princess Bride?”

“Yeah,” Rickon said.

“Okay you know when Buttercup pushes Wesley down the hill?” Gendry asked with a chuckle, “It was like that.” He then said, clearly to Ella, “ _Yes it was_.”

“What about the guy?” Robb asked, wondering what kind of asshole cuts off a woman skiing with her son.

“Oh uh, yeah,” Gendry noted, “He was _not_ quite so lucky. It’s possible that I broke his nose.”

Robb was not wholly surprised. He remembered when he met Gendry and he’d told him about meeting Trystane for the first time. It was clear that he turned into a bit of a beast for his younger sister.

It had been a long time since Robb settled anything that way, but if he had been there he wasn’t sure that the guy would have walked away with just a broken nose.

“As you should’ve,” Rickon clearly agreed.

“So what’s the deal?” Robb asked. “Can she walk?”

“Yeah, she can walk and everything. She’s got to stay home tomorrow which she’s pretty grouchy about but the doctor said after that she should just do whatever she’s comfortable with,” Gendry told him. “She really is fine, I promise.”

“Okay,” Robb let out a deep breath. “Can I talk to her for a second?”

“Sure, just… if she says anything… pretend she was given a horse tranquilizer and forget it,” Gendry noted.

Robb chuckled, thinking about how Jon had thankfully made Ella promise to delete his voicemails when he was drunk, “Deal.”

“Oh uh, and I’ll be back in town for work in early January,” Gendry said, “Let’s get a beer. Feels like I should know you better.”

He couldn’t help but be flattered and agreed readily, “That’d be great. Any closer on getting a transfer?”

“I’ll know when I see you next,” Gendry noted and then said, “Here’s Ella.”

“ _Robb?”_ she asked into the phone.

Robb’s insides melted and he took her off speakerphone and shoved Rickon away, “Hi darlin. You took a tumble, huh?”

“ _Yeah, I should have told you but I didn’t want you to worry,_ ” she told him, “ _I don’t want to make you worry._ ”

She sounded so sweet and sorry that it broke his heart, “That’s okay, Ella. I’m just glad you didn’t hurt yourself too badly. Did Gendry get the guy’s name?”

“ _Who? Oh. No. Why?”_ she asked.

“Just thinking of waiting for his nose to heal so that I can go and break it again,” he told her. She giggled into the phone and he sighed, “I miss that laugh.”

“ _I miss everything_ ,” she told him. “ _Are you having a nice time?”_

“I am,” he agreed and then told her something that he knew would make her happy, “Rickon and Lyanna want to come see us over their Spring Break.”

“ _You said yes,_ ” she cooed into the phone.

Robb turned to look at Rickon, “Did you mention this to Ella first?”

“What?” Rickon asked, “No!”

“ _Lyallana, no. No. Lyanna,”_ Ella corrected herself, “ _I’m all fuzzy.”_

He made a mental note to get some more meat on her bones because if Gendry was telling the truth, it was ridiculous that her body was reacting this way. He’d always known a light breeze could push her over, but still. He’d never actually seen it happen.

“Get some sleep, darlin,” he agreed. “I’ll check in on you in the morning, okay?”

“ _Okay_ ,” she agreed and then giggled, “ _Goodbye you gorgeous, gorgeous man._ ”

He grinned, “Goodnight you gorgeous, precious woman.”

She clicked off the phone and he put his phone back in his pocket. He looked over at Rickon who was sitting on the couch and smiling at him.

“What?” he asked.

Rickon shook his head and then mocked him, “I just like who you are is all, darlin.”

“Alright goddess divine,” Robb rolled his eyes and then went and sat back on the couch.

“She okay?” Rickon asked as he started playing his video game again.

“Yeah she’s fine,” Robb said gratefully.

“ _Yeah_ she is,” Rickon agreed.

Robb chuckled, “Watch it.”

“Now you sound like Lyanna,” Rickon sighed.

“DADDYYY,” Wes launched himself at him.

Robb pulled him into his lap and pressed a kiss to his head, “Did you have a good time reading with Grandpa?”

“Yeah,” Wes agreed. “We read _five books_.”

“That’s more than I read all year,” Rickon joked and then picked up the video game controller and handed it to Wes, “What do you say, little one, want to show your Dad how it’s done?”

“Yeah,” Wes agreed, sitting up straight. And then looked at the game and said, “Ooh this one is easy.”

“How do you know that?” Robb asked him.

“Theon taught me,” Wes explained.

“Of course he did,” Robb sighed.

“He taught me too,” Rickon noted.

“Really?” Wes asked excitedly, “We’re like twins!”

Robb grinned as Wes climbed off his lap and Rickon lifted his arm so that Wes could curl into his side.

“Yeah _baby!_ ” Rickon agreed.

“ _Yeah_ baby!” Wes repeated.

Robb felt his phone buzz in his pocket and he looked at it. It was from Ella.

_I don’t think I’m supposed to be texting you but I can’t wait to see you._

He smiled and texted back _It’s just the pills, I’m sure you’ll wake up in the morning and be sick of me._

The typing bubbles appeared immediately and then she said _I could never be sick of you_.

“Yeah _baby,_ ” he found himself saying softly.


	26. Chapter 26

If Myrcella had any doubt about how much she and Cole cared for Robb and Wes, it would have been eradicated when they were able to hug Gendry goodbye without sadness.

That was tempered by the fact they would be seeing him in a little under two weeks when he came to stay with them for his job, but even still. She knew it was the excitement both of them felt at the idea of seeing Wes and Robb that made it tolerable.

Cole had been up the whole flight, not wanting to risk falling asleep. She couldn’t blame him, because waiting at their baggage carousel was Wes and Robb, looking adorable and impatient. They had gotten back from Winterfell the day before and had insisted on coming to pick them up.

“WES!” Cole called excitedly.

“COOOOOLE!” Wes grinned, hopping off of the seat he’d been standing on.

She let Cole pull his hand from hers and sprinted towards his friend. Wes did the same and they met in the middle, wrapping their arms around each other.

In spite of the business of the airport due to holiday travel, people stopped what they were doing to watch the pair, and uncomfortably she even saw a few people taking pictures.

She rushed over to join them, but Robb unsurprisingly got there first. No sooner had Cole and Wes separated, than Cole was in Robb’s arms, each of them being squeezed nearly to death by the other as Robb rocked him this way and that.

“Ellallalalalllalalalla,” Wes said when he saw her.

She bent down that he could hug her and he barreled into her arms, knocking her backwards. She felt a twinge of pain in her still not fully healed tailbone but it didn’t matter because the weight of how much she’d missed him knocked her over as much as he had. He smelled like that perfect Wes smell, a combination of his shampoo, and Robb’s laundry detergent, and that little baby warmness he somehow hadn’t seemed to outgrow yet.

“Sweetheart,” she breathed him in, kissing his hair, her heart expanding to a painful degree, “I missed you so much.”

“Me too,” he told her neck, “We talked about you every day.”

She giggled, “Me too.”

He pushed away from her so that he could look at her, “We’re having a sleepover all weekend!”

“I know!” she grinned, “What should we do?”

“Woah, woah, woah, woah,” Robb cut into their conversation. He had Cole on his hip and he was so beautiful it threatened to knock her over all over again, “Before I lose you to planning, get up here, darlin.”

Wes scrambled off of her excitedly and Robb offered her his free hand. She placed hers in his and suddenly she was back on her feet and then off of them as he wrapped his arm around her and pressed a kiss to her lips.

She was very conscious of the fact that he was also holding her son and that his was standing right beside him, as it was the only thing that kept the kiss somewhat chaste.

He broke it and leaned his forehead against hers and she nuzzled his nose with hers, her eyes still closed, letting warmth flood through her body at the feel of him and the smell of him and _him_.

And then she felt another nose, and Robb’s surprised laughter. She giggled as Cole rubbed his nose against both of theirs and then they both kissed his cheeks.

Robb set her down, but not Cole and no sooner were her feet on the ground than Wes’ hand was in hers. She squeezed it, bending down so that she could kiss his knuckles.

They got all their bags, the four of them chattering excitedly and interchangeably. Robb was so impressed with how ‘little’ she’d packed that she didn’t bother telling him that most of their things stayed at the house. He rolled and carried their bags while she got the better job of holding Cole and Wes’ hands as he led them all to the car.

The airport was a bit of a madhouse, but in a grouchier way than it had been when they left. Everyone was returning home from their trips and was dismayed at the idea of returning to their real lives. She pitied them.

Their vacation had been wonderful, and if they lived closer, they would be up skiing every weekend during the winter, but they had said goodbye to the house with smiles on their faces precisely because real life awaited them.

Robb packed the car and she got the boys buckled in their car seats. When Robb had picked them up from the airport after Thanksgiving, she’d started to walk Cole over to Wes’ side of the car to get him buckled in. Robb had stopped her and opened the other door, revealing a second car seat that he’d bought specifically for Cole. She’d kissed him silly the next private moment they’d gotten and the next day she’d purchased and installed a second car seat in her car, wondering why she hadn’t thought to do so before.

She closed Cole’s door and walked around the back as Robb was closing the trunk.

“All set?” she asked.

“Almost,” he grinned, leaning down and kissing her with a bit less control than he’d managed in the airport. When they parted his hand stroked her cheek, “I’ve got to tell you this feeling right now almost makes the last two weeks worth it.”

She smiled, “You had a wonderful time, I know you did.”

“I did, _we_ did,” Robb agreed, “But everything without you two now has a ceiling. A threshold that can be met but not surpassed. Not without you.”

“Robb,” she breathed.

He smiled at her, “I just wanted you to know. You don’t have to say anything.”

“Okay,” she said, because there was no reason to say anything when he had already explained her own feelings so thoroughly.

So instead, she stood on her tiptoes and kissed him slowly, relishing in the fact that they didn’t have to rush. That they had all weekend to do just this, to be together and take their time.

“El,” Robb pulled away gently, wiping his cheek and then hers, “You’re crying.”

She realized then that she was and she laughed, “I’m just happy to be home.”

He took her cheeks in his hands and kissed her once more and then brought her over to the passenger seat and opened the door for her.

She wondered, not for the first time, if Cole and Wes noticed these things. If they saw in Robb how they should treat their future partners. The care he took with her. With her comfort and happiness. Or that she tried to return it in kind. She wondered if they understood that this was what it was supposed to look like.

“You want to head to your house, right?” Robb asked.

“Mommy no,” Cole said from the back.

“Yes,” she said to Robb and then turned around and smiled at her son, “We are just going to go home and get settled. When you wake up from your nap we’ll go over, okay?”

“I don’t need to nap today,” Cole said.

“Me either,” Wes said.

Robb started the car and looked in the rearview morning, “You were up at 4 am this morning, honey. Trust me, you’re napping.”

“4 am!” she grinned at Wes.

He giggled, “Grey Wind wouldn’t get up. He was _snoring_.”

Robb pulled out of the parking lot and eased them onto the highway. Cole and Wes were chattering happily in the back but she and Robb were silent in the front.

To her surprise, his hand reached over and took hers. She looked down at it and smiled and then raised it to her lips.

“Don’t push it,” he grinned.

“Is it distracting?” she asked.

“ _Incredibly_ ,” he admitted.

She lowered their hands immediately, ignoring the jolt of warmth she felt at her center. Robb interlaced their fingers.

It started raining harder and she released his hand, knowing he’d want it on the wheel. People were driving like crazy, clearly wanting to stave off a traffic jam and as a result being total idiots.

“Woah, woah,” Robb said, his hand never returning to the wheel as he stretched his arm out across her chest.

A little SUV had just darted in front of them, and then nearly collided with a sports car that was going to do the same from the other side.

And then a very strange thing happened. She was sitting in the car, feeling comforted by Wes and Cole’s quiet conversation and feeling incredibly safe from Robb’s driving and his arm across her chest, and yet she was simultaneously hit with a sense of dread.

“Get off the highway,” she told him.

But weirdly, Robb had already started to do so even as she was saying it.

He didn’t look at her but his arm lowered and he squeezed her leg as he brought them over to the nearest exit, 21.

As soon as they got off the highway and pulled onto one of the backroads, she felt a warmth flood her and only then had she realized how cold she had gotten. Robb’s hand left her leg and turned on the heat.

“Did you…,” she started, unsure of how to ask.

“Yeah,” he answered quickly, as though he already knew.

“Oookay,” she said as brightly as she was able, trying to ward of the lingering feeling. She turned around and looked at the boys and said, “We’re taking the long way home.”

Cole and Wes seemed totally unfussed by this and as she turned around she found that Robb’s hand was back on her leg. She covered his in hers and looked out the window as he drove them along the river.

When they stopped at a red light, Robb said, “Glad you guys got in before this started.”

“Yeah,” she agreed, knowing the false brightness in her tone echoed his.

The squeeze he gave to her leg told her that he’d heard it too and then he focused back on the road as the light turned green. It took a bit longer than it would have done on the highway but this road was much quieter and before too long, Robb was pulling down her drive.

Even still, when she turned around, she found Wes and Cole soundly asleep.

As Robb put his car in park she nudged his arm and he turned around and smiled at the sight of them. Any lingering strangeness dissipated at that sight, one of their favorite ones.

“We win,” Robb whispered.

She smiled and kissed his cheek, and felt his hand immediately cup the back of her head, stroking her hair.

They decided to leave the boys in the car while they unpacked the car. It didn’t take long and Robb went back on a second trip while she turned up the heat and picked up all her mail to go through.

When Robb returned with the last bag he also had a sleeping Cole in his arms.

“Do you want me to bring him up?” he asked.

“No, I’ve got him,” she promised, “Get Wes home.”

“Alright, just come over whenever he wakes up?” Robb asked and then smiled, “It’s _possible_ beef stew will be waiting for you.”

“Ooh you like me,” she grinned. “I’ll bring…nothing,” she realized, “I have nothing helpful to bring.”

“Good, because I have everything,” he told her. Then amended, “Well not everything but definitely enough to get us through dinner and breakfast and lunch and I maaaaay have picked up salmon because Wes was craving Arianne’s recipe and then he made me start craving it.”

She laughed, “Well then you both will get it. See you soon. Thank you again for picking us up.”

He stepped forward and placed a brief kiss on her lips and stroked Cole’s hair and then waved, closing the door behind him.

She brought Cole up to his room, piling an extra blanket on top of him as the second floor was still quite cool, and then shut out his light. When she went back downstairs she retrieved their bags, bringing the one that had laundry she hadn’t bothered doing straight into the laundry room and then bringing the other two up to her room.

Most of Cole’s clothes were clean so she pulled out a few outfits and pajamas, a few pairs of underwear, his waterproof parka and his Bunny and set them on her bed, leaving the rest to put away. She then focused on her bag and put away most of what was in it.

While they would be doing their share of lounging this weekend, she always brought her most beat up things to the ski house, as they usually didn’t see much of anyone for the entirety of their stay.

She went into her drawers and grabbed two pairs of lightweight pajamas. Though it was cold, Robb was an absolute furnace and she knew she’d have no need of flannel when she was with him. She grabbed a pair of jade joggers and a black pair of yoga pants, a pair of black jeans and a pair of blue jeans, a pale blue sweater and a cream one. She pulled out socks and then looked in her underwear drawer.

By now, thanks to their almost daily _coffee dates_ she had moved on from feeling the need to wear pretty lingerie every time he was going to see her in her underwear. Robb was more of a _get this offending garment off your body_ type of guy than a _look how good you look in lace_ kind of guy, but they were also usually rushing. He was very, _very_ generous in bed, as he was everywhere else, and he liked to ensure she was getting where she needed to be at least once, usually more than, and so he didn’t waste a lot of time getting them started.

This weekend though, they had time. Of course, they would be with the boys during the day, but tonight and tomorrow night, they would be on their own. They could linger and enjoy and admire.

She compromised and grabbed one pretty sports bra and a good t shirt bra, and a couple of pairs of everyday underwear, and then then a light pink lace bralet and matching boy short underwear.

She tossed all of that in a bag with Cole’s things and then hopped in the shower. After getting ready, pulling on a pair of high-waisted jeans and a white and black striped turtleneck, she went to get the house in order.

The mail was mostly junk but there was a letter from Arianne for Cole and a postcard from Shireen for her. There were a ton of holiday cards that she’d have to look at, knowing they would make her think _next year I should really do one_ even though she never actually did.

She turned the postcard over from Shireen and let out a squeal when she read the message.

Myrcella grabbed her phone and dialed and Shireen answered on the second ring, “What took you so long?”

“We just got back!” she explained.

“Oh, oh right I thought you got in last night for some reason,” Shireen told her, “Soo… is that okay?”

“Of course, it’s okay,” Myrcella said, “You might actually overlap with Gendry. He’s going to be here for work in a couple of weeks but I don’t know how long he’s staying.”

“Oooh the three of us are never in the same place,” Shireen said, “Maybe Tommy and Marg will come for a visit! Oooh ooh and we can all meet Robb and put him on the rack.”

“Shy,” Myrcella warned.

“We’ll just stretch him a _pinch_ ,” Shireen noted.

Myrcella laughed, “You’ll have to get through me. Oh he really wants to meet you… do you… I mean… Gendry’s already met him… but maybe you and Marg meeting him at the same time is for the best? You know… rip off the bandaid.”

“I’m touched,” Shireen noted drily, “I’m also going to tell Tommy you didn’t factor him in.”

“Well Tommy’s actually nice,” she reminded her. She heard a beep, “What are you doing?”

And then the line went blank for a second and a moment later Shireen said, “El? Marg? You both on?”

“I’m here,” Marg said, “What’s this about?”

“Okay, three weekends from now I’m going to visit Cole and Myrcella. Can you guys come? We can interrogate Robb together…” Shireen dangled.

Marg snorted, “What do you think of this plan, Ella?”

“I’ve never heard you ask anyone that,” Shireen pointed out.

“I learn from my mistakes,” Marg told her in a voice that was both sweet and pointed, and entirely unique to her.

Myrcella smiled, “I _love_ the idea of us all being together. Really, really love it. And Robb really wants to meet you guys…”

“But?” they prompted at the same time.

“But you have to be nice to him,” she ordered.

Marg laughed her bedroom laugh, “Of course we’ll be nice to him.”

“Can you get away for a weekend?” she wondered, “Isn’t that a terrible time…”

“Usually yes, but I’m miles ahead of where I should be and everything will be off my metaphorical desk in three weeks,” Marg said, “So actually… it’s sort of _perfect_.”

“So you have some time?” Myrcella asked.

“I mean, I’m not exactly twiddling my thumbs, but I always have time for you,” Marg told her.

“It’s actually for a friend… well not really a friend a sort of… do you know Roslin Frey?” she asked.

“Hold on I’m looking her up, the name sounds familiar. Maybe she dated Garlan at one point…” Marg said and they could hear her typing on her computer, “Oh, ooh no okay so she _didn’t_ date Garlan but she did try to. Looks like she just got engaged to Edmu-no.”

“What?” Shireen asked.

“Is this Robb asking?” Marg asked.

“No,” Myrcella promised, “I’m fairly certain there are very few things in this world Robb cares about less than who designs Roslin Frey’s wedding gown. We bumped into her and she was really keen so I told her I’d ask you and I was trying to find the right moment.”

“Yeah well,” Marg said, “You can tell her I said _no fucking way_.”

Myrcella laughed, “What did she like stalk Garlan or something?”

“No,” Marg scoffed, “She’s just so… not who I want written up in Strut as wearing one of my designs. You, on the other hand… this visit will give me the perfect opportunity to do the final fitting for your gown for the Annual Benefit. I was going to send it to you, but you know I hate doing that.”

“See so it’s perfect,” Shireen said, “I just booked my tickets. I’m staying for two weeks because I want to.”

“And also because I want you to,” Myrcella agreed. “Marg, I’m assuming you guys can only stay for the weekend.”

“Yes, but I’ll see if Tommy can make it a long one, he owes me and Lenny, he’s been working like a dog the past few weeks. He took calls while we were sailing. If Willas hadn’t been there I’m sure we would have capsized,” Marg informed them dramatically.

“That Willas,” Myrcella said, “So heroic.”

“Such a _good_ man,” Marg agreed.

“You guys are lame,” Shireen said, “And he’s the one who has failed to slide into my DMs so you know, maybe talk to him about _my_ good qualities.”

“What is a DM and how do you slide into it?” Myrcella asked. “It sounds dirty.”

“Only if you do it right,” Marg quipped which made Shireen cackle.

Myrcella rolled her eyes. She was very used to being out of the loop when it came to that sort of thing. It was nice dating Robb who was even more hopeless than she was, in spite of his four younger siblings.

“Alright, Marg, talk to Tommy and let me know,” Myrcella said, “I’ve got to flip the laundry.”

“Alright, and don’t think the fact that I haven’t mentioned that you’re about to spend the weekend with Robb means that I’m not expecting every sordid detail come Monday,” Marg informed her.

“Who is waiting until Monday?” Shireen asked, “Text me tomorrow. And I want a number. Let’s see if he can beat the first night.”

“Shy!” she chided.

“You can’t tell us that a man brought you to _that_ many orgasms in a single evening and expect us to forget it,” Marg noted. “I happen to believe in him though. I think he’ll break his record.”

“He’ll be thrilled to know that,” Myrcella teased, “Good _bye_ I love you both.”

They parted with _love yous_ and then Myrcella went and flipped the laundry. She busied herself with little things around the house and then went back into her room and started making a grocery list for that week.

She was halfway done when Cole appeared in her doorway, “I’m up.”

She smiled, setting down the paper, “I can see that. Did you sleep long enough?”

“Yeah!” Cole grinned, “Can we go?”

“Let’s get you changed first,” she told him.

Once she’d taken care of that she brought their little bags downstairs and pulled his parka out of his bag and then pulled on her own. It looked like it had stopped raining for the most part but looked bitter and she put mittens on him and tucked her own into her pocket.

They got into the car and Cole was talking a mile a minute on the way over. Him and Wes seemed to have made a number of plans for the weekend on the way back from the airport, and he was informing her of all the wonderful things they were going to do.

She realized when they were turning on to Robb’s drive that she had never actually told him they were leaving.

It didn’t seem to matter though, because as she and Cole got out of the car, the front door was opening and Grey Wind was rushing to greet them and Wes was shouting _welcomes_ and Robb was looking at her like he couldn’t understand what took her so long.

***

“This one,” Wes pointed.

“Are you sure?” he asked.

“Yeah because this and this and this and this,” Wes noted.

Robb looked at the cards he’d just pointed at and grinned. For some reason, both Cole and Wes liked to watch him and Ella play Gin Rummy. They were too young to play on their own, but Wes’ determination told him that it wouldn’t be long that that was the case. Cole was sitting on Ella’s lap, and she’d been trouncing him, but though Wes’ move – discarding an Ace – was a risky play, he agreed it was the right one.

“Ooooh,” Cole and Ella said in tandem when he put it down.

“Too bad I can’t use it,” Ella sighed and picked up from the pile.

“Aahhh,” Cole, ever the mystery, exclaimed.

Ella blushed and looked at him with sorry eyes.

“You’re out again, aren’t you?” he asked.

“I just got lucky,” she lamented, placing a card face down on the table and lowering the rest of them face up.

“Thank goodness I got rid of my Ace,” Robb said and then looked at the score sheet, “Not that it matters, because you’re at 525.”

“Rematch,” Wes said.

“You’re on,” Cole agreed.

“To _morrow_ ,” Robb destroyed all of their hopes and dreams.

“But it’s early!” Wes claimed though he had no idea how to tell time.

“It is waaaaay past your bedtime,” Ella smiled at them both, “But the good news is tomorrow morning we’re going to wake up and do all these fun things and more over again.”

“And the day after that,” Wes said.

“And the day after that,” Cole forged ahead.

“Where are we reading?” Robb asked.

“Your bed,” Wes said.

There had never been a single moment that he did not want to look at Ella, apart from this one. He knew that if he did, she would start laughing. Already in his periphery he could see her blushing and he was having a hard time keeping a straight face.

He had never expected Ella to be in his bed for the first time at his son’s invitation.

“Alrighty then,” Robb agreed and he heard Ella snort out a laugh.

“What is so funny,” Cole asked.

“Nothing baby,” Ella said with a straighter face, “I just got the giggles.”

Cole and Wes took this as a perfectly reasonable explanation and they all climbed up the stairs. They’d already gotten the boys into their pajamas, and he and Ella had taken turns getting into theirs, so they just went into Wes’ room to pick out books before all filing into his bedroom.

“Ella you _have_ to read this one,” Wes said, handing her _The Day the Crayons Quit_.

It was a frequent request whenever she was around. Sometimes her voice for the beige crayon would pop into his head during meetings and he’d have to fight to keep from laughing.

She took it from him and Wes and Cole climbed onto his bed, getting themselves comfortable on the pillows. Ella stood there looking at them, her arms crossed behind her.

“After you,” he said.

“Okay,” she all but squeaked. All three of them turned to look at her and she waved them all off, “Just warming up my vocal cords.”

And then he had to watch her climb on his bed. She didn’t make a meal of it or anything, but after two weeks without her and how unbelievably good she looked stepping off that plane earlier, it didn’t take much.

He cleared his throat and considered slapping himself across the face, but climbed onto the bed instead, leaning against the pillows.

The boys had parted to make room for Ella, and they both laid on her now, their heads on her tiny shoulders as she opened the book. He turned towards them all on his side and then moved closer so that he could wrap his arm around Wes.

His son cuddled into him, his soft hair tickling his chin as Ella started to read.

He’d realized on his third time hearing her read this book that to her each of the crayons had its own distinct personality. The voices she used for them were not interchangeable. Some were haughty, others squeaky, one _very very_ tired. Cole and Wes giggled with each one, all but jumping when she turned the page and they saw what was coming next, knowing as well as he did if not better.

As always she was a tough act to follow but Wes turned towards him and then rolled up and over him, plopping down on his other side. Cole climbed over Ella and snuggled up to him as well.

Ella was lying on her side facing them, her head on the other pillow.

“What are you doing over there?” he asked her.

She smiled and slid closer to them, wrapping her arm around Cole, her hand resting on his chest. He slid his arm underneath her and could feel her soft, golden hair across it.

He read the story, in a more measured voice, wanting the boys to wind down. It really was late for them and though they didn’t have any reason to get up tomorrow morning, the excitement would probably wake them up and if they weren’t careful, they would crash before lunchtime.

“ _One_ ,” Ella whispered as he neared the last page. He stopped reading and looked where she was gesturing to Cole and then she said, “ _Aaaand…_ ” he turned to see Wes’ eyelashes drooping and then closing, “ _Two_.”

“ _But it’s early,_ ” he whispered back.

She grinned and took the book from him and then got up, lifting Cole off of him. He picked up Wes and got off the bed and then grabbed Cole too.

Ella grabbed the books and followed him down the hall. He got to Wes’ room first and laid him down in bed. Grey Wind was already in there, it being well past his bedtime too.

He kissed Wes and moved to go to the door and then saw that Ella wasn’t following him.

“El?” he asked.

“I’ll be there in a minute,” she promised, but her eyes on Wes.

He nodded and walked to the door and then turned around. Ella had gone and put the books back on the shelf and was pressing a kiss to Wes’ hair, her hand stroking Grey Wind’s head.

It was clear in that moment that Ella had felt with Wes what he’d felt with Cole. He had missed her like crazy, but something had seized in his heart when he’d seen Cole today. It was as inexplicable as it was undeniable, and it scared him half to death.

He brought Cole down the hall to the guest room where Ella had stayed when they’d last been here. They knew that they could have put them together in Wes’ room, but he wanted this weekend to be the first of many, maybe even eventually, when things progressed further, these would happen on school nights, so it was good practice to have them separate.

Ella had already put his things away in the drawers, and he wondered if she didn’t feel the same. That he should get used to being there. That maybe, almost, this room, or whichever one he chose here, would be his.

Robb pulled the covers back and tucked Cole underneath, pulling the comforter up to loosen it as he knew Cole would ultimately want to burritoize himself.

He pressed a kiss to Cole’s temple and turned out the light.

“I love you,” he told him, even though he was sleeping.

He turned towards the doorway and saw Ella standing there. She was bathed in light and she had a beautiful, contented look on her face.

He crossed to her and closed Cole’s door slightly.

“Hi you,” he greeted her.

“Hi you,” she smiled.

“What would _you_ like to do?” he asked.

She looked up at him and grimaced, “Talk? I’m sorry. I missed you.”

He smiled and wrapped his arm around her shoulders, guiding her towards his room. She wrapped an arm around his back and leaned her head against him.

This time when they got into his room, it wasn’t awkward when they got to the bed. He climbed on, scooting back towards the pillows and then pulled her with him, so that she was sat across his lap.

She leaned in and kissed his lips and he could feel his heart working overtime.

“Ella,” he smiled against her lips, “I thought you wanted to talk.”

She smiled and pulled away, “I wish we could do both at the same time.”

He chuckled and tucked her hair behind her ear, “Thankfully we have time for a lot of both.”

She kissed him once more and then pulled away quickly, “So. There’s something I’d like to talk to you about.”

“Am I in trouble?” he asked.

“No, never,” her brow furrowed sweetly as though she couldn’t imagine it, “It’s just that… Well, you know Gendry is coming in.”

“I do,” he agreed.

“Okay, well I got home today and there was a postcard from Shireen, and she’s coming in a week later and staying for two weeks…” she told him with wide eyes.

“That’s awesome,” he grinned, “It’s been ages since you saw her, right?”

She nodded, “I’m really excited.”

“Really?” he asked, “Because I’ve seen you excited and um… it did not look like this.”

She closed her eyes and leaned her head against his shoulder, “Well… She thought, and I guess I agreed… no I _did_ agree, that well… Marg and Tommy should come in at the same time.”

“And that’s a bad thing?” he asked.

“No, it’s just a lot, for you,” she opened her eyes and finally explained.

“Ah,” he understood.

“And I don’t want you to feel any pressure, because they are going to just _love_ you,” she told him, “But… they _are_ coming partly to meet you and if it is too soon –“

“It’s not,” he interrupted. She opened her mouth and he pressed a finger to her lips, “I would expect the Starks to descend any day now and it will be more than _partly_ for you. I had a hard enough time getting them to not plan a spontaneous ski holiday last week.”

She giggled, “Really?”

“Really,” he told her truthfully, “I mean you’ve met some of them, and that’s made the others very jealous and those that _have_ met you think you’re just about the greatest thing that’s ever happened and would like to see you again very soon.”

“I’d like to see them too,” she told them. And then looked at him, “So you don’t mind?”

“I more than don’t mind,” he admitted, “I’m excited. But…”

“But?” she asked.

“I know how rare it is for you all to get to be together, and so I want you to not feel like you have to include me and Wes in every single little thing you all do,” he told her.

“Thank you,” she told him, her eyes looking into his sincerely, and then they softened, “But we have a threshold too and I very much prefer surpassing it.”

“Do you mean that?” he asked, though he knew she wouldn’t say it if she didn’t.

“I told you before,” she reminded him, “When you two are around, everything’s better.”

He kissed her then, because he couldn’t not. But he stopped himself, realizing that he had so much he wanted to tell her and so much he wanted to know. They had talked every day they were gone but there was still somehow so much they hadn’t mentioned or only in passing and an hour passed and then another.

He learned that she got a teeny bit punch drunk late at night, and her giggle against his neck was one of the most beautiful sounds he’d ever heard.

And when he told her that, she pulled away and looked up at him and there was still so much more to say but he couldn’t remember any of it when she was looking at him like that.

He lowered his lips to hers and she kissed him back as though he’d waited far too long. Her tongue slipped against his and her fingers gripped his hair.

He pulled her so that she was straddling him and he pushed the collar of her pajamas to the side so that he could kiss her warm, soft skin.

“ _Robb_ ,” she whispered.

He looked up at her and he saw a look in her eyes. A look he recognized, though he’d never seen it from her. He hadn’t been looked at that way in over three years and couldn’t quite believe that he was now, but it was there, and he would know it in the dark.

There were some things you just knew by heart.

He cupped her cheeks in his hands and told her, “I missed you so much.”

And he was sure that he was looking at her in the same way, the gods knew he’d probably been looking at her like that for some time now.

She didn’t seem ready to acknowledge it and she looked down and did the only thing that could have distracted him in that moment.

She tilted her head and pressed a kiss to his palm, letting it pull on her bottom lip as her eyes returned to his.

“Did _every part of you_ miss me?” she asked, her fingers trailing down his chest.

“Ev-ery _part_?” he asked.

He knew he sounded like a teenager but her fingers had reached his abdomen as her lips were kissing up his thumb, and her jade eyes were on his as her hand reached his pants and she took his thumb in her mouth.

She nodded, her tongue against the pad of his thumb.

“Huasfmnshmuh,” he was pretty sure he said.

She smiled, his thumb popping out of her mouth and she went to unbuckle his belt.

And then he heard the single most terrifying noise in his entire life. It was a blood-curdling scream.

He didn’t think, he moved her off of him as gently as he could and then sprinted towards the noise. Grey Wind was barking too and his heartbeat was thrumming in his ears.

Bypassing Wes’ room, because even when he’d woken with the most awful nightmares his son had _never_ sounded like that, he pushed the door to Cole’s room open.

He was still screaming but as Robb turned on the light he was at least assured, as he hadn’t fully been, that no one was in here with him.

“You’re okay,” he told Cole, told himself, “You’re okay.”

“ _Ro-o-obbb,_ ” Cole cried as he seemed to snap out of it.

He crossed the distance to his bed and pulled Cole into his arms. His little body was shaking and Robb wasn’t sure that his wasn’t too. His grip on his neck was vice-like.

“You’re okay, you’re okay, I’ve got you,” he promised.

Cole sniffled against his neck, and Robb hadn’t even noticed Ella come in but she was there suddenly, on her knees in front of him, her hand rubbing Cole’s back.

“It’s okay, baby,” she promised, kissing between his shoulder blades, “You’re okay.”

“Mommy,” Cole said.

Robb went to release him as he was sure he wanted her arms rather than his, but Cole tightened his grasp.

“I’m here,” she told him in the single most soothing voice he’d ever heard. He felt his own heartbeat start to steady. “I’m right here, baby. You’re safe, you’re with us, you’re okay.”

Cole stopped shaking but he was still crying, and Robb stroked his hair, his eyes turned to Ella. He felt her hand on his knee as she pressed her cheek against Cole’s back.

“It…was the shadowy man again,” Cole told them.

“Oh, I hate him,” Ella lamented.

“Me too,” Cole told her.

“He’s just lucky he only comes out in your dreams,” Robb told him, and Cole looked up at him, “Or he’d be getting a good ol’ knuckle sandwich from me.”

Cole let out a breathtaking giggle and then collapsed against his chest. He held him tightly, breathing him in, wanting Ella to keep talking so that his heart would steady enough to steady Cole’s.

As though reading his mind, Ella asked, “Should I tell you a story?”

Cole nodded his head. Ella looked at him, with something nearing an apology in her eyes and he shook his head. She looked at him almost sympathetically.

“What kind of story?” she asked.

“About you and Robb,” Cole mumbled against his chest.

Robb glanced at her and Ella’s eyes widened, and he wondered then if she didn’t tell Cole stories about Trystane in the same way he showed Wes videos of Jeyne.

She recovered rather quickly and then smiled, “Hmm… okay, let’s get you back into bed, alright?”

Cole didn’t release him so Robb scooted back on the bed and leaned against the pillows. Ella climbed on the inside and pulled the comforter up over them.

“So we know Robb is pretty cool, right?” she asked Cole. Cole nodded against his chest before rolling over and sprawling out against his chest. “But did you know he’s a real life _hero_?”

He had absolutely no idea what he had done to deserve such a title but Cole nodded against his chest.

“Oh you did, huh?” Ella asked, smiling at Cole and then her eyes glimmered as they looked into his. “Well… you know how I _occasionally,_ I mean, just _sometimes,_ every so _often_ , don’t exactly dress right for the weather?”

Robb coughed, “Always.”

Cole giggled against him and Ella dug her toe against his calf.

“Well, one day, I was really _really_ in big trouble. It had been sunny when we went inside but that was the morning when all us parents stayed for the first little bit of the day and you got to show us all the things you’d been doing,” she told him.

“Oh,” Robb said, a smile taking over his face when he remembered what day she was talking about.

It was just after they’d gotten together and Ella had shown up as though she was trying to get his heart to stop. Usually in the morning she wore jeans or yoga pants but that day she’d been dressed to the nines, in a pale blue wrap dress and heels, her lips painted movie star red and the golden waves to go with them.

She grinned at him, knowing he remembered too, and went on, “So, while we were inside the clouds were gathering outside. The sky turned white, and then grey, and then nearly _black_. And the thunder…ooooh it all but rumbled the school.”

“Ba _booom_ ,” Cole intoned.

“And when it was time to go all the other parents were _running_ to their cars,” Ella said, “And Robb noticed me, waiting by the door to the school. And he came over to me and said-“

“Having some trouble, miss?” Robb remembered.

Ella giggled, “And I was so frightened to go outside.”

“But you love thunderstorms,” Cole reminded her.

“I know,” she agreed, then admitted, “But I was wearing _really_ good shoes.” He chuckled, remembering the blush on her cheeks when she’d lifted one leg and tilted her foot this way and that. She grinned, “And do you know what Robb did?”

“What?” Cole asked, then rolled off of him and got on his knees so that he could look at him, “What did you do?”

“I uh…,” he grinned, “I handed her my umbrella.”

“But that wouldn’t help her shoes,” Cole told him.

“That’s exactly what your Mommy said,” he told him truthfully.

Cole looked at him and then turned back to Ella, “What did he say?”

Ella smiled at him and then said, “He said: _I know it won’t, but just hold it anyway. My hands are full._ ”

“And she said: _Your hands are empty,_ ” Robb remembered.

Ella went on, “And then he _scooped_ me up in his arms, cradling me like I was a little baby, and said, _Not anymore_.”

Cole turned around and asked, “And you carried her to the car?”

He could still hear her laughter as he, in his rainboots having known they were expecting a storm, stomped in puddles as he brought her to her car. Everything between them had been so new and tender, and he had remembered stopping and looking at her. Her cheeks were flushed from the wind and cool air, and the rain was beating down on top of their umbrella like they were standing underneath a waterfall, and even though his back was getting wet he would have stood out there all day if it meant she’d keep looking at him the way she was.

“He did,” Ella answered when he didn’t. “With _no_ regard for himself. And when he put me in my car he simply said _Now you have yourself a nice day, Miss_. And you know what?”

“What?” Cole asked.

“There wasn’t a _drop_ of water to be found on me,” Ella told him.

“And your shoes?” Cole asked.

“Oh, safe as can be,” Ella nodded.

“Good job,” Cole told him.

He chuckled, “Thank you.”

“So, what do we think, baby?” Ella asked gently, “Are you ready to try to go back to sleep?”

Cole nodded, laying down on the bed in between them and closing his eyes, “Will you stay with me?”

Ella looked at him and raised her eyebrows, her features knit in worry. She had told him, been so good at telling him, ever since he’d admitted his concerns about himself as a father, how wonderful he was at it, and how much that was wrapped into her feelings for him. Clearly he had to do a better job of telling her the same.

She was a mother in her bones, and he found it mesmerizing and wonderful and overwhelmingly attractive in a primal way he didn’t quite understand.

“Sleep well, you two,” he said, leaning down to kiss Cole’s forehead.

“No,” Cole opened his eyes. “You’ll stay too. Won’t you?”

He nodded, unable to speak, and now it was his turn to look at Ella to make sure it was alright. She didn’t smile at him, but her face answered every question he had all the same.

She got up from the bed and went and turned out the light, and he and Cole settled against the pillows. She crawled back in on Cole’s other side and her arm extended over her son so that her hand could rest on his chest.

They lay there for a moment, and something felt wrong.

“I’ll be right back,” he told them.

“Okay,” they both offered with sleepy voices.

He got out of bed and walked down the hall and opened the door. Both Wes and Grey Wind were lying in bed on their backs, his dog clearly having returned when it was clear that Cole was well tended.

Robb walked around the bed to Wes’ side and scooped him up. Grey Wind was too tired to care and stayed sleeping as he walked out of the room with Wes back to Cole’s.

As though Ella had known exactly what he was doing, she and Cole had shifted over on the bed to give more room, and he laid Wes down next to Cole and then climbed back into bed.

He turned on his side and reached for her, feeling the silkiness of her pajamas as he rubbed her slender arm.

He heard Wes’ steady breathing, and then Cole’s, already back asleep. And then a big hurrumph.

He heard the smile in her voice when Ella said, “Get up here you big baby.”

And then he felt Grey Wind jump onto the bed, walking around and around and then settling at Wes and Cole’s feet, his body extending the length of them all.

“I’m sorry,” Ella said in the dark.

He moved his hand up her arm until he could feel her soft cheek in his palm.

“Yes,” he answered, “I missed you with _every_ part of myself. But Ella?”

“Yes?” she asked.

“This… this is the _part_ I missed the most.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> ya'll still with me?


End file.
